Digimon Frontier Refreshed
by KeikoTakishita
Summary: What if there were 12 legendary warriors? The warriors of time and love? And what if somebody new had to take control of one of those? New character, and not used as a main character, no pairings so far, but maybe some after it gets going.
1. The start

Well, my first fan fiction! I'm sooo excited, too!

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon, but she does own the plot changes, the character Keiko and all of her family, personality and everything along those lines.**

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Keiko Takishita sat on her bed, trying to paste a flower on her school project, she sighed in defeat, setting the flower back down and laying back on her bed. She felt a vibration on her bed and looked to see her cell phone vibrating.

She opened it up and looked at the message that was on her screen, 'Would you like to start?' it read. Keiko looked at it for a second, wondering what it could possibly mean.

She took in a breath and clicked on the 'yes' option.

The phone lit up and spoke a message, "Keiko Takishita. You have been chosen." Keiko jumped up in shock. "Chosen? And how do you know my name?" she asked the phone. "You were chosen for a reason. Take the 6:00 westbound train to Shibuya station." The phone answered back, it showed a message that corresponded to it's words.

Keiko grabbed her phone and looked at the time, she had a half hour. She walked down to the first floor of her house and into the kitchen. She saw her oldest brother, Naoki, sitting at the table. "Naoki?" she asked quietly.

He looked up at her. "My friend and I want to see the new bakery, can we go? I heard the cookies are really good." He nodded, "Sure Kei." he said. She walked over to the closet and pulled out her black sneakers and slipped them on quickly. "Any boys going to be there?" he asked, tensely.

She stood up and smiled at him, "Of course not." she said with a soft smile. He nodded and she walked out the door rolling her eyes in the process, it was time to find out exactly why she had been chosen.

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Sorry about the short chapter. The next one will basically her profile and what I have to say about this character.


	2. Takishita Keiko and the story

Well, second update. I would like to thank celestial writer for being my first reviewer!! Success is coming! Or not... Well anyway, just read it.

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Name: Takishita Keiko

Age: 11

Hair color/style: Brown, down to shoulder blades, pin straight

Height (as compared to the others): Shortest besides Tomoki, a little bit shorter than Takuya

Eye color: Bright blue

Body type: Normal

Clothing: Black short sleeved shirt with the word LOVE (L and O next to each other on top and V and E on bottom next to each other)on it L (Lime Green) O (Neon Orange) V (Neon Pink) E (Neon Blue). Short jean shorts and black sneakers.

Skin: Same as Takuya

Personality traits: Kind, Funny, Klutzy, Caring, Listener, Outgoing, Fiery, Easygoing, Athletic

Life summary: When Keiko was 9 her parents died in a plane crash, leaving her three older brothers to look after her. Naoki who is 20, Keiji who is 17 and Saburo who is 13. Her parents owned a worldwide corporation that left the children extremely wealthy.

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READ THIS!!: Keiko was a character I made to be not so much a main character, but more like an equalizer. I didn't want her to be the obnoxious add in, but I always plan to write her with depth and kindness. (And no, she won't bring up her "horrible" past every two seconds-- that's exactly what I DON'T want.) Keiko will only have two evolutions, spirit and beast. As I said before she's not a main character. I just thought the story would be pretty cool with her in it.

Things about this story:

-This will follow the basic guidelines of digimon frontier with some add in 'episodes' and dialogue changes, also some action changes when the time calls for it.

-I will use all english names except for the characters. The digimon names will be the same and the location names will be as well.

-The episodes will be pretty much the same.

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	3. First encounters

Third chapter! This one willl be longer and so will the ones following it.

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon frontier. But she does own the plot changes and the character Keiko and all of her attributes.**

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Keiko bounded out of the house and jumped off the porch like she always did. She knew it was quite childish, but they had lived in the house all their life and it was like her good luck charm to jump off the porch.

Keiko walked up the long drive way and down the Shibuya city sidewalks.

She looked back to her gated home with a sigh. Keiko had always felt sheltered, her brothers really didn't trust her to do much.

She wasn't allowed to girl-boy parties, or to wear a two piece bathing suit around any other boys that weren't in the family. Keiko always got along with her brothers, but like all families they clashed.

She had the problem that she never knew how to trust, her brothers never trusted her, so how was she expected to trust anyone else? Keiko wasn't the type to give out secrets, thanks to this little set back, but she was a very social person.

She had a ton of friends in school and she was very popular. She had been nice to everyone, making her likeable to everybody.

Keiko walked into the subway station and grabbed a ticket from the machine. She made her way to the six o'clock train with her arms lazily on the back of her head.

She was pretty tired, she had just had shooting practice with her soccer team. She yawned and hoped she wouldn't be out too late, also hoping there would be food wherever she was going.

She boarded the train and stood up, holding onto the safety bar. She stared out the window in boredom, watching all the people rush around the busy station.

A boy about her age ran into the train before the doors closed, muttering something about not believing he could have made it. _'This city sure has some characters.'_ she thought to herself as he slid down to a sitting position.

Suddenly about half of the phones on the train went off, including hers. She looked at her phone which said to get to the station before 6:00 p.m.

Suddenly the boy yelled and grabbed his head in frustration, "COME ON!! I'M DOING THE BEST I CAN!!" he screamed. Keiko turned her head away from him, stifling a giggle.

The train came to a stop and she got off the train and onto an elevator with a boy about her age as well, who had long raven hair. There was silence as the doors shut, until the boy who kept yelling came sailing through the door, landing a foot away from Keiko.

The boy rubbed his face and groaned, "Hey, did you guys get a message too?" The raven hair boy turned away rudely.

Keiko and the brunette boy looked surprised, "Well, I did. It told me to come here." she said.

The boy nodded and suddenly the elevator lurched and flew down with great speeds. It slammed to the bottom, causing the brunette boy to fall over again, "Man, I really need to stop landing on my head." he mumbled.

Keiko and the raven haired boy both looked at the huge station in awe.

Keiko immediately ran down the steps and towards the baby blue train, she thought it was the best color of all of them.

Soon enough the train began to move and the raven hair boy walked into her car.

"Oh, hi." she said with a friendly smile, "I'm Keiko, what's your name?" she asked. He stared at her as he walked by and walked into the other car. She stared in shock at his behavior.

"What's his problem?" she mumbled.

She stared out the window for a moment when suddenly the lights died out. Then the train shook and she fell out of her seat. She clutched her cell phone in her hand tightly as the train shook all over.

Keiko looked down to see her phone disintegrate into a neon orange and lime green device of some sort. She furrowed her brow and stared at it in confusion.

The train stilled back onto it's smooth course and she stood up slowly and took a seat. The lights eventually flickered back on and it was as if nothing ever happened.

Keiko picked at the device, trying to figure out what it did. She sighed in defeat and settled on putting the device in her pocket.

Keiko stared mindlessly out the window when the train halted and the doors opened.

She stood up and walked out of the door and saw the boy and nobody else.

"Hey!" she shouted and ran over to him. He let out an annoyed breath and narrowed his eyes at her, "What?" he said coldly.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"Why do you care?" he growled.

She wouldn't back down. "Well, I was just thinking it'd be safer if we stuck together." she said.

He sighed and turned around, "I'd rather be alone." he said and began to walk away.

She walked next to him, matching his pace, "Well I'd rather you stick with me. As much as you may think you can do this alone, you can't. We'd be safer together and I never said anything about becoming your partner or anything." she said.

He turned to look at her, "Fine." he sighed and kept walking.

They walked in silence. "So, where are you from?" she asked.

"If I'm going to be stuck babysitting you, I'd prefer it be in silence." he said.

Keiko sighed and decided not to argue with him, "Well can I at least know your name?" she asked.

"Kouji." he said gruffly.

Kouji.

She would remember that.

Kouji: The first person Keiko could possibly hate.

What would she have to deal with in this place?

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Another short chapter. The next ones will be longer. I promise. But please read and review. And be honest! No flames though :) Anyway the next chapter will incorporate some more Kouji and Keiko arguing and a little more humor. Please stick with this! I promise this will rock when I organize it some more.

Keiko creation fact: Keiko was originally going to be an only child named Kairi.


	4. Lobomon: Spirit of light

Well, updates!! I've planned out everything, and boy will this be good (once it gets going of course) Well, time for the good old disclaimer!!

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon Frontier. But she does own Keiko, Keiko's digimon and everything affiliated with her.**

* * *

Keiko and Kouji looked out to the city in front of them. As soon as the train stopped Kouji got right off the train, leaving Keiko in the dust.

"Kouji Minamoto. Commence your search." Kouji's D-tector said.

"Search? For what?" he replied confused.

"The spirit." it said in the same monotone voice.

"Spirit? And how do you know my name? Hmm?" he asked all the questions almost at once.

"Find the spirit and you will find the answers to all your questions." It said.

"Not good enough." he growled, "I'm not some lap dog you can just order around, you know." There was silence from the D-tector. "What is this spirit anyway?" he was pressing the questions. Silence. "I mean, how do I know where to look for it?"

The sign on his D-tector disappeared almost immediately. He growled in frustration. Suddenly a pop out map came from his D-tector.

"What's this?" he said in surprise. Silence once again. "This gets weirder by the minute." he said.

The train released steam, "You said it!" the train said to him.

Keiko stepped off the train and looked at Kouji, she had heard the talking and was a bit confused, "Who were you talking to a minute ago?" she asked staying a couple feet behind him.

He sighed, "Mind your own business." he said then began to walk away.

Keiko narrowed her eyes, but stayed silent as she followed him. They walked out of the terminal and into the metal covered city. Two boys, one a bit older than them and the other much younger ran by laughing.

"There goes an accident waiting to happen. They really shouldn't be wandering alone in this place, but, oh well. I'm not here to babysit more brats." he said looking at Keiko and implying to her.

Keiko stared at him. "Why do you have to have such an attitude?" she demanded. He turned and began to walk away, her following, but angry nonetheless. They were wandering in complete silence and made their way deep into a forest.

They searched in vain, "This is getting old." Kouji complained with a sigh.

As soon as he said that, the map disappeared and Kouji looked around with a gasp, his eyes settling on a cave.

"It's probably safer to stay away from creepy holes in the wall." he groaned in frustration, "But I didn't come all this way to play it safe."

He walked towards the cave and Keiko followed, "This better not be someone's idea of a joke." he muttered as they walked down the stairs.

He turned towards Keiko, "You stay." he growled.

"No, I'm not separating from you." she said, matching his glare.

"Whatever." he muttered and walked down the stairs.

"Anyone here?" he yelled in.

Silence.

"Okay. I suppose not." he continued with a glance at his D-tector.

They walked for several minutes when they ended up on a ledge high in the air.

"What's this?" Kouji said quietly.

"Why would it lead you here? Are you sure you followed the directions right?" she asked.

"Of course I did, I'm not an idiot." he barked.

She was about to reply to him, but she was cut off by voices screaming.

"HELP!! SOMEBODY!!" yelled the same older boy from before.

"I don't have a chocolate bar!" the younger one screamed in terror.

"A chocolate bar?" Keiko muttered, confusedly.

Strange creatures about the size of a head began piling in and attacking the boys, while they screamed.

Kouji jumped down and grabbed a pole, using it to slide down quickly, yet gracefully, and he landed on the ground as if it was nothing. He attacked the creatures after breaking the pole from the ground as if he had been fighting for years.

He scattered them all onto different walls and the one who was the leader landed in front of Kouji and Kouji smiled triumphantly.

"It's not over yet human!" it shouted. A strip of rainbow went around it and it turned into a huge and ugly muck monster.

It turned around and spat out acid at the other two boys, causing them to flee.

The younger fell over in his attempt to escape and Kouji scooped him up and got him out of harms way.

The sludge disintegrated the floor, receiving a gasp from Keiko. _'I've got to help him!'_ she thought to herself, _'But how do I get down?' _She looked at the drop to the ground, realizing it was at least 30 feet. Keiko gulped, but when another acid shot went Kouji's way she knew she had to get down quickly.

She managed to crawl over to the wall and started to descend, but when the sludge monster stomped it sent shudders through the wall, as well as Keiko tumbling down.

She hit the floor and slid on her stomach with a groan. She had always been a klutz, so this wasn't new to her.

"Ooh! It smells!" she heard a feminine voice yell. Keiko turned to see the older boy with two new people, one girl with blonde hair and the boy that jumped into the elevator the same day.

Keiko was deep in thought when he heard the oldest one yell out "Look out kid!" she saw Kouji rush by and acid head her way.

Keiko scrambled away and onto the ridge the others were on.

"Are you alright?" the blonde girl asked, "That looked like a bad fall."

Keiko shook her head, "I'm fine." she said.

The boy from the elevator incident was tapping the keys on the D-tector furiously. "Work! Work!" he shouted.

"What do you mean?" Keiko asked the boy.

He didn't answer because she gasped at the sight of the monster walking towards Kouji and the youngest boy, "Going somewhere?" it said.

"Come on, Come on!" the elevator boy yelled, his screen lit up and a sign appeared on the screen.

Kouji almost fell into the hole after taking one step too many backwards, but managed to stay on the solid ground.

"Ugh! SPIRIT!!" the elevator boy yelled "Execute! Spirit evolution!" In a flash he turned into a huge being, with long blonde hair and red armor. "Agunimon!" he yelled, as flames surrounded him.

He jumped in the air and knocked the muck monster into a wall, sending acid everywhere. He jumped back to Kouji and the little boy and deflected acid from hitting them, "Now's your chance! Run!" he yelled.

As soon as he said that he returned to a human in a flash of light.

"Huh? What's going on I turned back into me." he said in shock.

Kouji and the younger boy stood up and looked around as the light from outside seeped through a the holes in the wall. Suddenly the monster shot out acid at the three boys.

"Watch out!" the elevator boy yelled, wrapping his arms around the younger protectively and pulling him to the ground, knocking Kouji into the hole in the process.

"Oh no!" The elevator boy yelled, as Kouji yelled in panic as he fell down the hole.

"Kouji!" Keiko yelled, terrified, "Kouji! No!" she howled.

Suddenly light emmited from the hole and a large creature, similar to the one the elevator boy turned into, floated gracefully above the hole. It had white armor and short blonde hair with a long scarf.

The monster shot sludge at the creature and it yelled out, "Lobo Kendo!" a large light sword appeared in it's hand and it sliced through all the acid it shot out at him. He jumped through the air and stuck the sword into it's head, causing it to leak purple liquids, then have the same strange light surround it.

"Now you're talking trash heap." he growled.

The D-tector appeared in his hand and he slid it across the light while yelling, "Fractal code! Digitize!" the monster disappeared and the blonde girl clapped her hands together, "Malto Bravisimo!" (spelling?)

The light surrounded Kouji and revealed him breathless on the ground on his hands and knees.

The elevator boy ran up to him, "Hey you okay? Let me help you up." he said, reaching out a hand to touch him.

"Don't touch me." Kouji barked, "I don't need your help, or anybody else's."

Keiko climbed off the ledge and ran next to Takuya.

"But I guess I should thank you for saving me. I always repay my debts." Kouji said, a bit softer than before.

"I didn't do it so you'd owe me, you know." the elevator boy said.

"My name is Kouji Minamoto. And you are?" There was more silence. "So are you gonna tell me? I can't repay you if I don't know your name."

"I'm Takuya Kanbara." he said.

"Takuya, huh?" he turned and walked away, "See ya." he said with a wave of his arm.

"I'm Keiko." Keiko said quietly, "And I'm sorry about his attitude. Maybe we'll see you around?"

Takuya nodded. Keiko was about to walk away when she saw the young boy, "Can I ask your name?" she asked.

"Tomoki." he said quietly, with a smile.

"Hi, Tomoki." she said, flashing white teeth at him.

"Keiko, let's go." Kouji growled.

"Bye guys." Keiko said and jogged to catch up to Kouji, following him out of the cave.

The sunlight was disappearing, but it was bright compared to the cave, causing Keiko to shield her eyes.

"Why didn't we stay with them, Kouji?" she asked.

"If you wanted to stay with them so badly, why didn't you?" he barked.

"I didn't mean it like that." she said.

He sighed, "Come on, it'll be dark soon."

They walked through the forest in the same comfortable silence as before.

"That was nice of you." she said.

"What?" he asked back, his voice not changing it's low tone.

"To save Tomoki, the little boy." she said.

"Not really. He couldn't even protect himself. Was I supposed to just let him die?" he said, looking at Keiko.

Keiko sighed, "It was just nice, that's all." she said quietly.

_'Why can't he be like that all the time?' _she thought to herself as the sun set.

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Muahahha. Another horrible chapter. I promise you this will get much much much better as it goes along. Thanks for reading! Reviews would be excellent, just so you know.

Keiko fun fact: Keiko is afraid of being upside down.


	5. Abandonment and Kazemon

Updates are so fun. Right?

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon. But she does own Keiko and all Keikoness in the story. So if you steal her, I'll shove a bottle inside of you and kick it until it breaks.**

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After a day of pointless traveling, and Keiko in no position to get her spirit the duo decided to get off at the next stop.

Kouji and Keiko began to sit in the same car, but across from each other. Keiko was staring out the window and Kouji was looking down at his D-tector, observing it.

"You must go to the forest terminal." it said in its monotone voice.

"The forest terminal? Sure. Why not?" he muttered to himself.

Keiko looked up at Kouji from across the train car. "How come only yours talks now?" she asked.

"Dunno." Kouji replied, looking out the window.

A long and silent- besides the train's panting- train ride went on. It must have been an hour later that the train arrived at the station.

Kouji stepped gracefully off the train and Keiko stumbled out tiredly.

The train yawned, "Just call me the naptime express." it said, before snoring loudly. Keiko made her way to a bench and was almost immediately asleep on it, laying down.

Kouji yawned and sat on a bench about 10 feet away. "I'd better catch a snooze, too. This looks like as good a place as any." he muttered. Silence overcame the station, the only sounds Kouji could hear was the loud snoring of the train and the light breathing of Keiko. "All this quiet really gives a guy time to think." he said quietly.

* * *

Keiko woke up to a bright sun. She sat up and stretched. She turned and saw Kouji sitting on the bench. He looked over and she smiled tiredly, "Morning." she said with a yawn.

"Afternoon's more like it." he said dryly.

Keiko sat in a more comfortable position. "So… Now what?" she asked quietly. Kouji shrugged in response.

_'He's not gonna talk Keiko. Give it a rest.'_ she thought to herself.

They sat for a while in silence when they heard talking from the other side of the platform.

"It's called breezy village." the white digimon said. "It's called what now?" the blonde girl, named Izumi replied, Keiko figured out their names because they said them a few times, the older boy was Junpei.

"Welcome tourists." Kouji said, "So this isn't it?" he added standing along with Keiko.

"You're right it's not." the white digimon said.

Izumi giggled, "Hey Kouji, hey Keiko, what's up?"

Keiko smiled, "Hi Izumi, how are you guys?" she replied, Keiko longed for a friendly conversation for a long time.

Kouji jumped off the platform and walked along the tracks.

"Where ya going?" Izumi asked.

"Where I go is my own business, thanks for asking." he growled back in reply.

Izumi growled, "Oh! You're so anti social!" she shouted back.

"I'm sorry guys, but I have to go." Keiko said quietly, following Kouji.

"They remind me of white chocolate, it may look good, but no taste." Junpei said to Izumi.

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Keiko walked a few feet behind Kouji, making sure she wasn't in his personal area. They had been walking quite a while when a sound came from Kouji's D-tector.

He pulled it out curiously, "Is this a spirit?" he asked.

"I don't know." Keiko replied.

"I wasn't talking to you." Kouji said with a glare.

Keiko turned away.

"Hah. So strangers are in the village, eh?" "That's trouble." "They're human children."

Kouji looked at Keiko and they both ran behind trees to eavesdrop.

"Ah you think those whiny wall flowers called them in to come and help?" "Who cares?" "Nobody can stop the mushroomon brothers." "We'll get 'em." The three voices all laughed.

"Come on." Kouji muttered, motioning for Keiko to follow him, and she did.

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The voices and whatever were making them disappeared and Kouji and Keiko began to walk for a long while.

Suddenly they heard screaming and explosions.

"Let's go." Kouji said and began to sprint back to where the others were.

Keiko managed to match his pace as they blew through the forest. They got there in time to see a tree like digimon about to hit Izumi with it's bark-like arm.

"Hey! Cut it out!" Kouji yelled.

Izumi jumped out of the way, almost getting hit.

"Izumi!" Keiko yelled.

"No!" Kouji yelled.

Junpei ran up to the large digimon with a shovel, "You can't do that to my friend!" he yelled, hitting it with the shovel, the shovel breaking in the process. The tree turned and hit him, knocking him through the air and onto the ground.

Kouji looked at his D-tector and lifted it in the air, "Execute! Spirit Evolution! Lobomon." Once again he was the white armored wolf looking digimon.

He turned to Keiko, "Make sure the kid's okay." he growled. Keiko nodded and ran over to help Junpei.

Lobomon leaped through the air and used his light sword on the tree digimon, hitting it in the forehead.

"Hahaha! Was that a love tap?" the tree digimon asked.

"Howling laser!" Lobomon shouted, a laser coming from his hand, hitting it in it's already broken forehead.

"Obviously you've been taken over by evil." Lobomon yelled. The crack grew until it was a huge hole, causing the tree digimon to yell out. "Shadow creature! Be purified by the light!" Lobomon yelled as he digitized the digimon. "Fractal code! Digitize!" he yelled.

The huge digimon soon became 3 mushroomon.

"Hey, what happened to us?" one asked. "Where are we?" Another one said. "What up?" the other asked. "Were we in a bad dream?" the first asked.

Lobomon leaped in the air, away from the mushroomon. Devolving in the air.

"Kouji." Izumi gasped.

"Is that all there is to it? That's it?!" Junpei asked in a whiny voice.

Kouji fell to the ground exhausted. His D-tector was flashing, causing Kouji to press a button.

Grass spread through the barren land.

"Fractal code, render." the voice said. The land was lush and green once again. "Breezy villages' fractal code is returning." Bokomon said.

All the floramon and mushroomon were talking by the new tree, discussing recipes and such.

Kouji was still on the ground and Izumi walked over to him, and put out a hand to help him up. "They're all pretty happy thanks to you." she said cheerfully.

Kouji stood up on his own.

"You know Kouji, you could try being friendly." Izumi said as he walked away with Keiko following.

"Keiko." Kouji said, stopping in place. Keiko who was about 15 feet behind stopped as well, "Yeah?" she replied.

"Don't follow me. Stay with them, stay alone, I don't care, just don't be with me. You're useless to me unless you can spirit evolve. And you can't." he said coldly.

Keiko sighed then smiled, "I understand." she said quietly.

Kouji nodded and walked into the forest.

"Keiko?" Izumi said walking up to her and putting a hand on her shoulder, "Want to stay with us?" she asked.

Keiko looked down, "I… I couldn't… I was a jerk to you guys." she said in guilt.

"Keiko. Please come with us. We _want_ you to come. Besides, I need a girl to talk to." she said with a wink.

Keiko smiled sheepishly. "Thank you Izumi." she said.

"We have returned!" yelled a triumphant voice, it was Takuya and Tomoki.

"You blew it! Where were you two?" Izumi demanded.

"That's quite a story, after a while we thought you might need us, so we checked back in." Takuya said with a sheepish grin.

"No, you made a wrong turn and missed a once in a lifetime show! And by the way Keiko is with us now." Izumi exclaimed, gesturing to Keiko.

"Hi Keiko. Yeah right, don't try to psyche us out Izumi, you know we didn't miss a thing." Takuya replied.

"Well you didn't get to see me spirit evolve." Izumi said with a teasing tone.

"Wait you did what?" Takuya asked in shock.

"You spirit evolved?" Tomoki asked.

"Mhmm." Izumi confirmed with a nod.

Takuya and Tomoki exchanged glances and they started laughing.

"Yeah right." Takuya said.

"Like you could!" Tomoki said with a giggle.

"You're a really thought we believed that!" Takuya exclaimed, they laughed some more.

"I've had it with you guys! You run off and then you don't think that a girl like me could spirit evolve?!" she yelled, marching over to them, "I'll evolve your heads!"

She put them both in headlocks.

"What am I nobody? Tell me why I don't get a spirit." Junpei asked nobody in particular.

Keiko looked over at him, but didn't know what to say, she barely knew the guy. She sighed.

"It's like starting all over again." she whispered to herself.

* * *

Fact about my making Keiko!:

I made Keiko to be quite a normal girl. Not too... Insane?


	6. The fifth spirit Beetlemon

Alright. New chapter!

**Disclaimer: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon Frontier, but she most certainly own Keiko and these plot changes.**

The five children stood in the dry canyon, when a sudden wind whipped past them, causing them to shield their eyes.

"Hey, cool! My ears are full of sand!" Neemon yelled with a giggle.

"Yes. And your head is full of rocks." Bokomon replied with a scowl.

"Wow, I haven't been in a wind this strong since, well, forever!" Tomoki added.

"Me neither." Keiko replied.

Suddenly a trailmon was speeding their way, on the same track they were walking on. "Comin' through, Comin' through!" it yelled.

"That was close." Junpei gasped.

"Ohhh. Why do things in the digital world always come out of nowhere?" Takuya asked.

"What do you mean nowhere? We were walking along train tracks." Bokomon replied.

"So?"

"So, where there are tracks there are trains, it's sort of like the whole smoke, fire thing."

Suddenly there was a huge gust of wind, but from a factory.

"Wow! Awesome!" Tomoki exclaimed.

"Welcome to the Wind Factory Incorporation!" Bokomon announced.

"Wind factory incorporated?" Izumi echoed.

"A division of mother nature enterprises!" Neemon added.

"Buzz 2, 3, 4. Buzz 2, 3, 4." The seven looked over to see some sort of metal digimon walking by in a single file line.

"Hey some digimon." Takuya said looking over. **Kokuwamon. Machine digimon. When they feel threatened they let out a million volts of electrical charge. Their special attack is power surge. **

Suddenly one of them fell, causing a chain reaction of them all falling.

Tomoki giggled. "Well if there are that many digimon around, then there must be some food around here somewhere." Bokomon said. "All right! Then let's have us a feast!" Takuya declared running ahead.

"But Takuya, hold on!" Junpei yelled after him.

"Why, what's up?" Takuya said, walking back over to Junpei.

"Listen Takky, as long as you're heading out to get some food, would you mind bringing me an order to go, with an extra everything?" Junpei asked, rubbing his stomach.

"What?! I'm not the pizzamon. It's every tummy for itself!" Takuya said with a growl, running back to the factory.

"Last one to fill their plate is a rotten egg!" Takuya exclaimed with a victory yell, the others behind him.

Flashing red lights went off as the seven entered the factory area.

Small digimon hanging on little strings swung down, "Warning, warning, warning! A warning from Minomon!" it yelled in a miniscule voice.

"Hello there." Neemon said.

"Are you not listening to me? I said warning warning! Warning! No trespassers allowed in the wind factory! No entry! Leave now! Go home! Stop! If you don't obey our warning we will commence our fierce attack!" Two more Minomon dropped down next to it. "You have now been warned! Stop! What we're trying to say is GET OUT!!" they said in unison.

Takuya backed into Junpei.

"Now would be a real good time for me to wait in the car, if we had one." Junpei said.

Izumi scoffed, "Boys." She stepped up to the Minomon, "Excuse me, we're just here for a tour of the factory." Izumi said sweetly.

"Let's makethe first stop at the exit door, okay?" Junpei mumbled.

"Then come on down!" The Minomon exclaimed.

* * *

They all walked in admiring the building, when a glass window came into view. They all immediately pressed their faces against it. "This is great. I love watching other people work." Junpei said.

"That's not weird at all." Keiko whispered to Izumi, causing her to giggle.

"We're not the only ones watching." Bokomon said, attention being drawn to the Goblimon watching the Kokuwamon.

"Are you enjoying your tour?" Minomon asked, dropping in next to Keiko and Izumi.

"Yeah." Izumi said with a smile.

"It's really cool." Keiko added smiling as well.

"Do you have any questions?" it asked.

"Can we slide on this floor in our socks?" Neemon asked.

"If you feel you must, go ahead." the Minomon replied, its voice still cheerful.

Suddenly Junpei grabbed himself and wiggled around.

"What's wrong?" Tomoki asked.

"I really need to find a bathroom. Like, right now!" Junpei yelled, running down a corridor.

"First door on your left!" the Minomon yelled.

Junpei ran over to the bathroom, when he heard someone yell: "Hey you!" he stopped.

"What was that?" he said, frightened, "Whatever it is, it can wait!" he yelled rushing into the bathroom.

After taking care of business, Junpei walked out of the bathroom, wiping his hands with a handkerchief.

"Much better." he sighed. He looked over at a door and was walking over to inspect it.

"Hey! Junpei! Hurry up! Did you fall in?!" Takuya yelled from down the hall.

"I'm coming already!" Junpei yelled back, going back to the others.

* * *

"This is the backbone of the wind factory! It's where all the ultra super high tech machines are made!" Minomon explained.

"So cool!" Tomoki exclaimed.

"And you call that high tech?" Bokomon questioned.

"Fans?" Tomoki asked. Fans were going up and down conveyor belts.

"And ugly ones at that. Gray is so last season." Izumi said.

"Izumi. Since when is gray out? _Everyone_ wears gray." Keiko said back.

"What's so high tech about a stupid fan?" Junpei pondered.

"Hey! It sure beats a folded piece of paper!" Minomon said in the same ecstatic voice, causing the others to moan.

"Now, before we move on, any questions?" Minomon asked.

"Yeah!" everybody said in unison, "Where's the cafeteria?"

* * *

Everybody sat at the table, staring at the food that was set on their plate. Batteries. "So, what exactly do you call this?" Izumi asked.

"A nine volt omelet?" Neemon said.

"Eat up everybody!" Minomon said in a sing song voice.

"They're really lovely batteries, but…" Izumi began, only to be interrupted by Minomon, "Oh, you'll love them. Look at how much Kokuwamon likes them!" it exclaimed, as a Kokuwamon absorbed it's electricity.

"Be sure to save room for dessert! It's alkaline!" it said excitedly.

"We can't eat this." Takuya and Junpei said in unison, dropping their batteries to the ground.

"Yeah. Don't you have anything sweet? You know, for special guests?" Tomoki asked.

"How about a AA pie?" Minomon asked. "No thanks!" everybody shouted in unison.

* * *

"I'm worried we might have offended the Minomon." Izumi sighed, as they walked out of the factory and were now outside.

"Yeah, we might have overreacted to everything." Keiko agreed.

"We offended them more than the lunch offended us?" Takuya asked, sarcastically.

"Can we get back to worrying about my stomach?" Junpei asked.

"Stupid batteries!" Takuya growled, kicking a battery.

"Wow! Nice kick!" Keiko exclaimed, getting glances from everybody, "Sorry." she muttered, embarrassed that soccer just had to be her calling.

"Hey, what's that?" Izumi said, noticing several crude buildings behind a fence.

"It's a building with a fence around it, too obvious of an answer." Bokomon said sarcastically.

"Well let's check it out." Takuya said. They all jogged to the buildings and saw many Kokuwamon standing around. Suddenly one which was much older stepped up with a groan, causing them all to stop in their tracks.

"So this-" Takuya began. "Is where the Kokuwamon live." Izumi finished.

"At least they're out in the sunshine." Neemon said in his normal naive voice.

"Yes, where they can sweat and rust." Bokomon said.

"Poor things." Keiko whispered.

Four small ones stepped up to Junpei and Tomoki. "You're kinda funny looking." one said, causing the others into a fit of giggles.

* * *

They were invited into one of the buildings, where a Kokuwamon told the story of how they were enslaved and forced to work in the wind factory.

"Man that just blows." Tomoki said.

"Yeah, and everything seemed so normal when we toured the factory." Izumi said, with worry in her voice.

"I had a feeling something was wrong. My gut told me." Junpei confided.

"Great, even your stomach's a know it all." Takuya said under his breath, "So how come they needed your labor in such a modern factory?"

Kokuwamon explained that they give off electrical charges when they are scared, so the Goblimon scare them constantly, they use the electric charge on the factory.

"So that was the noise I heard when I came out of the bathroom." Junpei pondered aloud.

The Kokuwamon complained about the factory, about no pay, hard work and no vacations.

"Well why don't you leave?" Tomoki asked.

"Yeah." Junpei agreed, "When the going gets too tough, the really smart ones get going."

Takuya glared angrily at Junpei, "Are you out of your mind?! If they leave, the Goblimon will track them down and smash them into little pieces!"

Junpei looked just as angry, "Let me guess Takky! You got some bright idea they should ban together and fight back!"

The two boys scowled. The Kokuwamon explained that they couldn't fight, and besides the Goblimon security was too tight.

"Well, it seems like those are your only two options." Takuya said, his voice calming quite a bit.

"I suppose if we had to choose, we would prefer the running option." Kokuwamon said.

"If you guys run now, you'll never stop running. If you fight them, you could be free forever." Takuya said triumphantly, "You don't have to do it alone, we'll help you beat them!"

Junpei disagreed with Takuya, "Hey! Who died and made you decision guy, anyway? What if we don't want any part of this fight?"

"I'm in!" Izumi exclaimed, standing up. "Me too!" Tomoki chirped. "And I'll help!" Keiko said. "Excellent!" Bokomon and Neemon shouted. All the Kokuwamon stood up, "Yeah! Let's do it!"

"Well, something tells me those Goblimon are gonna get the shock of _their_ lives!" Takuya exclaimed.

* * *

The plan was that as soon as they left Keiko would stand guard outside of the building, making sure no Goblimon came in, fighting if she had to. Izumi would make a distraction in the main gate, so that the Goblimon would gather there. Everybody else would go into the factory and wait for the right moment to attack, they would all hit the assembly line and leave.

"I'm not going." Junpei said.

"What?" everybody echoed.

"Why don't you guys take care of this one, and holler if you need me." he said.

"What are you saying Junpei?" Takuya growled.

"I'm saying that you guys are on your own. You don't need me, you probably don't even want me. I can't become a digimon like you guys! I'm just tall… Sweet… Cuddly."

"Junpei, that doesn't even matter! I can't spirit evolve, but I'm still helping!" Keiko said encouragingly.

"Man Junpei, I will never understand what your problem is!" Takuya said, glowering.

"My problem is you! Trying to make me do what I don't want to!"

"Oh yeah!?"

"You two are going to make the Kokuwamon cry." Bokomon said.

"We understand what Junpei is going through."

Kokuwamon said, "You, see before we met you we never even dreamed of fighting back, but you have given us hope! And that is something we haven't had in a long time. And you can see how strong we can be, if we just believe in ourselves. We believe."

"You do?" Takuya questioned.

Junpei walked away, muttering to himself about believing in himself.

* * *

**Alright, I don't really plan on doing a play by play on the fighting scenes, because nothing changed. So I'll skip to the end. If you're interested in seeing the fight scenes go to youtube and look it up digimon frontier episode 5. I'll skip to the end.**

* * *

"You can all go back to your real homes now." Junpei said after meeting up with Keiko and the Kokuwamon the next morning.

"I was right to believe in you." the smallest Kokuwamon said.

Suddenly two Minomon flew by in a gust of wind, shouting "Warning! Warning! We're getting carried away in the wind here!"

This caused laughs from everyone. "So can we find some food? Please? You guys?" Junpei said over the bouts of laughter.

* * *

Finally! I finally finished this one! For some reason, this one was torture to write. But I'm not just happy because I disliked writing this, I'm excited because this is the last chapter until Kouji joins the team and I get to incorporate the Keikoness!! Anyway please review, it will make writing this tortue chapter worth while.


	7. KaratsukiNumemon's task

Seventh chapter already. This fic is going by a lot quicker than I expected it! I'm very happy about my progress, and I really hope you all keep reading.

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita does not own Digimon, but she does own Keiko and everything that has to do with Keiko.**

* * *

"WHAT?! NO MONEY?! GET OUT!!" Izumi and Takuya, sailed out of a small restaurant. Suddenly Bokomon, Neemon and Keiko flew out and on top of them. Followed by Junpei then Tomoki.

They all managed to separate themselves from the huge pile. "But we're really hungry! And we do have money! See!" Izumi said stepping up to the huge digimon that kicked them out of the restaurant. It slammed the door in her face.

Bokomon slid next to her, "You have money? Let me see." he said. Izumi showed him the money she had in her hand and he grabbed it out. "You call this stuff money? If I were him I would throw you all out too!" Bokomon said, throwing the coins.

Izumi huffed as she, with Keiko's help, picked up the money.

"So what's money like in the digital world?" Junpei asked, "You're so smart, how do we get our hands on some, huh?"

"Simple. Get off your lazy bums and get a job." Bokomon replied.

"You want us kids to work? That's what an allowance is for!" Takuya declared.

"Yeah, can't you let us borrow some?" Tomoki asked.

"Bring on the cash!" Takuya and Junpei said in unison.

Bokomon pulled out a huge wallet from the pink waistband he wore. "Ooh! Big bucks!" Keiko and Izumi chanted.

Bokomon opened it and flipped it over, nothing coming out of it. "As you can see, I too am broke. Now, let's get a move on." he said as he and Neemon walked away. He turned after about 30 seconds to see them all sitting on the ground groaning.

"We're too hungry to move!" Keiko groaned.

"We need food so badly Bokomon!" Takuya said.

"We can't go any further." Junpei declared dramatically. Junpei was about to say another complaint when he noticed a sign that read: Heroes wanted. All your meals free. "Hey you guys look!" he yelled.

The five children all stood up. "I'm brave enough to eat!" Takuya declared as they all raced to the door with the sign. They all skidded to a stop in front of the door, to see large snail looking digimon, all looking extremely sad. "Uh… We're heroes?" Takuya said cautiously, causing their faces to light up.

* * *

The children all hid behind bushes by a trailmon train track, their faces all sticking out of the bushes. A train whistle went off loudly. "There's the train." Takuya said.

"Duh." Junpei said dully.

"Attitude?" Keiko said, standing up for Takuya.

"Shouldn't we hide?" Izumi said.

They all went back into the bushes. "I wish we knew what these guys wanted us to do." Takuya said.

"Relax, I'm sure they have a good plan." Izumi assured him as the digimon dropped onto the top of the end of the trailmon, ropes coming from the bushes. Suddenly the cart the children were sitting in, inside the bushes, flew out and onto the tracks.

Takuya settled himself between Izumi and Tomoki in the front, Junpei was in the far back, Keiko sitting on the back left hand edge of the cart and Bokomon and Neemon somewhere in the middle. "I hope all their ideas aren't as crazy as this one." Takuya said quietly, as the digimon slithered down the ropes and to the cart. They explained how a creature named Grumblemon attacked and stole their women, because they couldn't find the fractal code of their mountain.

"Don't worry we'll stop them! Right guys?" Takuya said.

"Right!" Izumi shouted.

"Of course we will!" Keiko said.

"I guess so." Tomoki said shakily.

"Whatever." Junpei said dryly.

"Bokomon? I'm not sure I understand this, why would Grumblemon not just take the fractal code?" Izumi said.

Bokomon explained that in some places fractal code is in the open and in others they are hidden.

"Hmmm. Alright, now about that chow." Junpei said, licking his lips.

"Hold on…" Takuya began, "You want us to go through that?!" he demanded, looking at the winding track ahead of them, it went down huge hills, and through upside down loops.

They all screamed in terror as the train went around the loops, down huge hills, over large bumps and ending by crashing at the top of a mountain. The children held on for their lives on the side of the mountain, holding onto a sideways fence.

"Well, that wasn't so bad." Izumi said.

"What's your definition of bad?" Junpei asked.

"Falling off of this cliff!" Izumi yelled, staring at the huge drop beneath them.

"Come on heroes, we're almost there." the KaratsukiNumemon yelled.

"Are you kidding me?" Junpei yelled, "Sticking to the side of a cliff is easy for you guys, but one slip and we're gravel pancakes!"

"Just how do you propose we get up to you? We can't stick to walls!" Izumi shouted up to them. A ladder fell down to them in reply to her inquisition.

Takuya climbed up, followed by Tomoki, then Keiko, the Bokomon and Neemon. Junpei and Izumi stood at the bottom, "Ladies first." Junpei said nervously.

Izumi gasped, then scowled. Junpei looked questioningly at her. "I'm wearing a skirt!" she shouted. "No, I didn't mean! Not like!" Junpei stuttered. "As if you didn't know! Sicko!" Izumi yelled, slapping Junpei across the face.

* * *

Takuya was almost at the top of the climb, "Yeah! Almost there!" he shouted.

Tomoki noticed a figure in the window, with a large stick in hand. "Hey! Takuya wait!" he exclaimed.

Takuya popped into the window, "Yes!" he exclaimed, only to be hit in the face with a stick. He whirled around, "Who the hell did that?!" he demanded, his face red where he was hit.

He saw Kouji standing there in a defensive position. "You're here?" Takuya questioned.

"You're the people these guys found to help out?!" Kouji demanded harshly.

Everybody poked their heads into the window.

"Kouji?" Keiko said quietly.

"Heh. So you ended up following these guys, huh? Like a lost puppy dog." Kouji said with a laugh. He turned to the KaratsukiNumemon, "All you've got here is a hungry idiot, an obnoxious blonde, a helpless kid, some pansy and a hothead wannabe leader. These guys won't be able to help you at all."

Takuya growled, "I'll help you right upside the head!" he yelled.

"Well, at least give us a chance." Tomoki said.

"Thanks, but no thanks. I mean, look at you, the only thing you'll do is get in my way. Is it my fault you're not up to my level?" Kouji said with a scoff.

"Watch it stick boy or I'll-" Takuya was interrupted by the KaratsukiNumemon, "Gentlemen, please! My thanks to all of you, for coming to help, and now it's time to eat."

"All right!" everybody but Kouji and Keiko exclaimed, Keiko pretty much became silent at just the sight of Kouji, she hadn't planned to see him at all.

Everybody in the window fell out and into the house, it was on the side, so they all ran into the walls with a crash. "Well, at least we'll get some good food to make us feel better." Junpei whimpered.

* * *

The food offered to the children were different colored heads of lettuce.

"Is that what I think it is?" Takuya asked.

"I don't know, looks like rabbit food." Junpei answered.

"Well at least rabbits get to eat." Izumi said picking up a brown head of lettuce. She took a bite then grinned, "Molto Bono! Dig in! Tastes like steak!" she exclaimed.

Everybody picked up a head and took a bite.

"Mine's like chicken!" Junpei said.

"Mine's a potato." Tomoki added.

"I got lasagna!" Keiko exclaimed.

"Mine's like asparagus!" Takuya said excitedly.

Everybody at once expressed their dislike of asparagus, "Hey! I like asparagus!" Takuya said defensively.

Takuya looked over to Kouji eating alone in a corner. "How'd he get here?" Takuya asked the KaratsukiNumemon.

"He fell from the sky!"

* * *

The sun was setting and the children were staring at the map, looking at the plan.

"Well, Grumblemon has the captives in a cave. It's right about here." Kouji said pointing at the map.

"We'll have to get in and out quickly."Takuya said.

The KaratsukiNumemon were all sticking to the walls around them worriedly.

"Just relax." Junpei said.

"Don't worry about it." Keiko added, smiling sweetly.

"Leave everything to us! Legendary warriors!" Junpei shouted triumphantly.

The KaratsukiNumemon backed up into the walls nervously all gasping.

"What's the matter?" Izumi said.

"You mean you're all legendary warriors." The lead KaratsukiNumemon asked.

"Well, not me." Keiko said raising her arm a bit.

The KaratsukiNumemon grouped together and started talking about something.

"Hey, what's got them so worked up?" Tomoki asked.

"Believe me, I'd have trouble believing you guys were legendary warriors too." Bokomon assured them.

"It's time to go to bed." The leader of the KaratsukiNumemon said, grinning nervously.

"And I say, it's time to get the girls!" Takuya exclaimed.

"No, no! You need your rest!"

"Uh… Okay then."

* * *

Takuya turned over in his semi-sleeping state, facing Kouji.

"What?" Kouji growled.

"Huh? Hey, I didn't like you at first, but it's nice what you're doing for the KaratsukiNumemon and all." Takuya said.

Kouji hmmphed and turned around, "They helped me first, but don't think I'll help you." Kouji muttered.

Takuya turned around angrily, _Like I'd even want your help._

Takuya woke up to see a huge drop beneath him, he was tied up and was dangling above the cliff. He looked around to see that (from the left) Neemon, Bokomon, Keiko, Kouji, himself, Izumi, Junpei and Tomoki were all tied up as well. They all started to panic, besides Kouji.

"What are you doing?!" Kouji yelled.

"We'll give you back to your partner in exchange for our women." The lead KaratsukiNumemon shouted.

"Partner? What partner?" Keiko shouted.

"You dirty sneaks is that why you brought us here?" Takuya yelled.

It shook it's head, "I think it is you who are the dirty sneaks. Pretending to be caring helpful strangers, when you are really legendary warriors!"

"And what's wrong with that?" Izumi yelled in panic.

"The time for your games and lies is over. Soon you'll be back with your ally!" it shouted.

"Ally? What are you talking about?" Kouji yelled.

"Don't play dumb, we all know you're in league with Grumblemon!" it yelled.

Suddenly a rock exploded next to them. "Now give fractal code or bad thing be happen!" A voice echoed from the makeshift cave that was just created.

"Oh yeah? Says who?" Takuya yelled.

"Says me! Grumblemon!" the voice yelled, and out came a big nosed, yet relatively short digimon, "Give fractal code or else, and you no want to see what or else means."

"I didn't realize there were bad legendary warriors." Bokomon said.

"Grumblemon, if you want to save your allies give us our women. Or else they will fall." the lead KaratsukiNumemon said, looking to his left at the KaratsukiNumemon over Keiko, nodding. It took out a small sickle and cut a small piece of the rope holding her up in a way that would cause her to fall about a foot.

"Hey! Stop that!" Takuya shouted.

"Only if you give us back our women!" it called back.

"Me no care about human kids." Grumblemon said, scratching his chin.

"You mean you really don't care about these children? But they're legendary warriors, too!" KaratsukiNumemon said.

"They're legendary warriors?" Grumblemon asked, "Looks like I get some spirits for Cherubimon!" He pulled out a huge hammer and swung it at the children, causing all but Keiko to lift their legs, Keiko just ducked her head. The KaratsukiNumemon fled and Kouji growled.

He leaped into the air and used a flying sickle to get free from the binds, sending him off the cliff. "Kouji!" Keiko yelled as he fell and in the process spirit evolved, he used the rope to swing and kick Grumblemon in the gut.

The KaratsukiNumemon pulled the kids up and onto the sideway fence in which they were tied up.

"Sorry about tying you up." the leader said.

"No problem." Takuya said, "Ready guys?"

Everybody nodded and they all spirit evolved.

"Good luck!" Keiko yelled as they all leaped into battle mode.

* * *

Once again I'm not writing the battle scene, that would literally take FOREVER!! So if you ARE interested then go to youtube and look it up, digimon frontier episode 6. Now I will skip to then end.

* * *

Lobomon and Agunimon sat on the frozen tundra Kumamon created.

"Quagmire twister!" Gigasmon shouted. It knocked into Beetlemon and sent him into the sideways fence that Bokomon, Neemon and Keiko were all sitting on.

The three fell towards the ground, but Bokomon and Neemon were all caught by Kazemon and Beetlemon. Keiko on the other hand kept falling, only to be grabbed by Agunimon and pulled onto the safety of the now frozen Kumamon.

"I take fractal code in name of Cherubimon!" Grumblemon shouted, "Fractal Code Digitize!!"

The mountain started to rumble and everybody was separated, Kouji, Takuya, Keiko and Tomoki fell into a hole in the ground, and Izumi, Junpei, Bokomon and Neemon were launched through the air.

"Our mountain! Gone!" the KaratsukiNumemon yelled, as the mountain disintegrated.

* * *

Ooh. Cliff hanger. Well, not really. But anyway I hope you enjoyed lucky number seven chapter. Please please please PLEASE read and review!!

Keiko fact: Keiko plays soccer and volleyball. She is the captain of the soccer team and the volleyball team's high scorer in high school (I'll get to that in another fic.) muahaha


	8. Toyland?

Woohoo!

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon, but she owns all Keikoness in this fic!**

* * *

Keiko, Kouji, Takuya and Tomoki screamed as they fell down the huge tunnel of the hole. "Man is this ever gonna end?" Takuya yelled.

Finally they reached the end and they fell straight towards the ground. They landed in a giant ball pit that sent them bouncing back up one more time. "This looks like more fun than it is." Tomoki groaned.

"You're not kidding." Kouji replied.

Takuya pushed the ball on top of him off, "Wow, is this a big playground?" The others uncovered themselves as well. "And if it is, who needs a playground this big?" Takuya said again, looking at the giant playground in astonishment.

"We're gonna find out aren't we?" Tomoki sighed.

"Of course." Takuya said, exasperated.

* * *

After finally climbing out of the ball pit, the four wandered around. "Keep your eyes peeled for Izumi and the guys." Takuya said.

"Something tells me they're not going to be easy to find in this place." Kouji said, staring at the surroundings.

"It's pretty big, they're probably lost too." Keiko said with a sigh. They heard a buzzing sound and saw a small flying robot go by.

"Hey, maybe that flying guy knows something." Takuya said.

"A flying type robot! Neat!" Tomoki yelled excitedly, running over to it.

"Wait!" Takuya yelled, chasing after him.

_'I don't know which of them's worse.' _Kouji thought to himself, as he and Keiko jogged after them. The robot landed by a small car track and a few other toys.

"Check it out! This is awesome!" Tomoki exclaimed, kneeling down and putting some cars on the race track with a smile.

"Hey, where'd he go?" Takuya said with a sigh.

"Don't sit down! We don't have time for this!" Kouji shouted. Tomoki giggled as the cars went around the track.

"What a baby." Kouji growled.

"I am not! These are just really cool toys!" Tomoki snapped.

"Yeah, they're cool, but this probably isn't the best time to be playing with toys." Takuya said.

"Aww, come on! When else can we play with all these neat toys?" Tomoki whined.

Takuya looked down, "Hey, is this the flying robot?" he said to himself, picking it up. He pressed a button and it's arm shot off, "Hey! That is cool, super robot punch!" he exclaimed.

"Not you too!" Kouji shouted.

"Uh, well… I-I guess not… Put down that stupid toy!" Takuya yelled awkwardly.

Tomoki sighed softly.

* * *

They walked through the playground in a line, Takuya in the front, followed by Keiko, Kouji then Tomoki. "I wonder what happened to Izumi and Junpei." Takuya pondered.

"I think our best bet would be to go to the forest terminal." Kouji said.

"Yeah, I bet we could meet up with them there, you think?" Takuya replied.

"Think there could be any trailmon around here?" Keiko wondered.

"Hey guys, look!" Tomoki said excitedly from the back of the line. Tomoki was carrying a green balloon and a stuffed pig. He pressed the ear of the pig and it started oinking, sending Tomoki into a fit of giggles.

"Hey, I we decided that now was not the time to play!" Takuya said.

"You decided?" Tomoki said sadly, lowering his head and letting his balloon fly away.

"Calm down, don't start crying." Takuya said panic stricken. Tomoki sneered and turned away.

"Oh man. I feel bad." Takuya sighed.

"Why because of him? Little baby has to grow up sometime." Kouji growled.

"Don't be so mean. He's just a little kid for Pete's sake."

"Whatever." Kouji said coldly, walking ahead.

"Kouji, don't do this." Keiko sighed almost inaudibly.

"No! You can't just say whatever, now listen up! I know you're not used to having friends, but you're part of a team now, so you'd better show some support!" Takuya shouted.

"Great idea, let's support the useless kid up until the point where we all die because of his stupidity." Kouji fired back.

"No wonder nobody likes you." Takuya said with a sigh.

"Takuya." Keiko said firmly.

Kouji spun around, "What do you know?!?" he demanded.

"Come on you guys, if you keep fighting, we'll never get to the forest terminal." Tomoki said.

Keiko nodded, "Tomoki's right, we should go." They heard a ringing and turned to see a miniature train, big enough to they could all sit on the top.

"Hey! It's a train!" Tomoki exclaimed.

* * *

"Yeah some train." Kouji growled. Tomoki was sitting on the front of the train, Takuya on the same car as Tomoki, and Keiko on the front of the next car, with Kouji facing backwards with his back turned.

"Some _toy_ train." Tomoki corrected him.

"Yeah, whatever. Just drop it okay? It's bad enough I have to ride on this thing." Kouji muttered.

"Kouji's playing with toys!" Tomoki, Takuya and Keiko chanted. Kouji growled in response.

They were moving quickly when Tomoki glanced off to the side, "Hey Takuya! That's wild! A giant walking teddy bear!" he exclaimed.

"Maybe it knows how to get to the forest terminal." Takuya said.

On that note everybody jumped off the train, surprisingly with no incident from Keiko, and ran towards the teddy bear. The yellow bear turned and stared at the four, without warning it dashed over to them, grabbed Takuya and threw him to the ground. It raised it's arm in the air, "I am still undefeated!" it shouted. It picked Takuya up and put him back on his feet, "Now we wrestle for the championships!" it shouted.

"Yeah! Then I'm next!" Tomoki yelled. Takuya grabbed Tomoki's hand and ran away, Kouji and Keiko following.

"Wait! The championships!!!" the bear shouted.

They ran into a pirate ship and hid there, the bear running right by. "That was close." Keiko said.

"That bear's dangerous." Kouji muttered.

"And you didn't even get thrown down by him!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Well, I don't know. He seemed kind of fun to me." Tomoki said.

"Fun? Are you nuts?!?" Takuya exclaimed.

The ship suddenly moved and sent everybody to the floor, it swung back and everybody slid the other way, eventually grabbing onto something. Keiko had her eyes shut tightly, "This is just like the ride at the carnival!" she shouted over the creaking of the ship.

The ride lasted about a minute, and the screams of terror lasted that long as well. Everybody exited the ride shaking and unable to walk straight, all but Kouji who gracefully stepped down the stairs. Tomoki had a bad reaction to the ride complained he didn't feel very good.

Takuya bent his knees a bit, "Hey, you want a piggy back ride?" he said.

"Gimme a break! Make the kid walk!" Kouji exclaimed.

"Look, it's no big deal. He's not feeling good so I'll help him out." Takuya sighed.

"Oh yeah? And what happens if you're attacked while you're carrying him? You'll be too slow to run, that's for sure!" he barked, "You're about the worst leader I've seen, you never think ahead!" he said with an exasperated sigh.

"Well at least I think about someone besides myself, Mr. definition of the word selfish!" Takuya snapped back.

"I can walk." Tomoki said quietly.

"You guys…" Keiko sighed.

"Tomoki, are you sure?" Takuya asked in worry.

"Yeah, I mean I really don't have a choice." Tomoki said with a sigh.

"Hey, I have an idea. Why don't we go to see if anyone lives in that house?" Takuya said, pointing to a house not very far away.

Tomoki nodded and everybody walked over to the house.

* * *

"Now I know what it's like to be a kid in a candy store!" Takuya exclaimed, as he looked around and saw the candy filled shelves inside the house.

"And it's the best thing ever!" Tomoki exclaimed, running to a shelf with cotton candy. He took a bite of his own and gave one to each of his friends. Takuya immediately dug into his and Keiko pulled off a small piece and popped it into her mouth.

Kouji on the other hand didn't touch his, "We do NOT have time to sit around and stuff our faces with candy! We have to find a way to get to the forest terminal! We're not out having fun at a carnival or something! You understand? Are you listening to me? Man, you're infuriating!" he shouted.

"What are we supposed to do? We're floating on an island!" Takuya said.

"There's another example, of why you'll never be a good leader. You just give up. It's like you don't even want to help your friends at all. I mean, take a look at what you're doing right now."

"I don't see you coming up with any ideas."

"At least I'm not just eating, we need to think about the other Legendary Warriors!"

"Legendary… What are you talking about?"

"What if the other six warriors turn out to be on the enemy's side?"

"But…"

"If they are we'll need a plan! We have to think about the worst case scenario, not just play games and eat sweets, or we might not make it out of this world alive!"

"Look, can we not talk about this right now?"

"What, you mean not in front of Tomoki? I don't care if he's young, he has to face the truth!"

"I'm sorry you hate me so much." Tomoki said in a depressing voice.

"I don't hate you, it's just…" Kouji trailed off and stared at the ground.

Keiko stepped a bit closer to Kouji trying to read his emotions, she sighed, when his gaze didn't change at all, it was as if he was in deep thought. Takuya walked over to Tomoki and put a comforting hand on his back.

* * *

Walking out of the house in the uncomfortable silence put everybody on edge.

"Does anybody want to talk?" Tomoki said, trying to break the silence.

Keiko jumped at the opportunity, "Yeah, we could talk about, movies, food school-"

"How about we talk about getting to Forest Terminal and what we're gonna do about the last six warriors." Kouji growled.

"Well, um… Maybe that's not such a good-" Keiko began.

"Ugh! You're unbelievable. I told you I didn't want to talk about it in front of Tomoki." Takuya said, his voice tense.

"Well, let's just-" Keiko tried.

"And I told you that you can't treat him differently than the rest of us" Kouji said, his voice dry.

"Uh… You guys, let's try not to fight-" Keiko was really trying to end the fight.

"Yeah, well you can respect that he's just a kid?" Takuya said.

"I think that it'd be a good idea to just drop-" Keiko said.

"So are you." Kouji replied.

"Kouji." Keiko said tensely.

"Oh yeah?" Takuya challenged.

"Takuya." Keiko said, her voice rising.

"Yeah." Kouji growled.

"Knock it off!" Keiko yelled, surprising the other boys that Keiko would raise her voice.

"You guys! Help!" Tomoki shouted. They turned to see Tomoki being carried away by the same bear, only now it was black.

"Keiko! How come you didn't tell us he got grabbed?" Kouji demanded.

"Yeah! You were right next to him!" Takuya shouted.

"You're saying this is my fault?!? I was trying to get you immature jerks to shut your faces!" she shouted back.

After she said this Keiko turned and ran towards Tomoki's captor, Takuya and Kouji right behind.

"Hey you big fuzzy creep! Give our friend back now!" Takuya shouted. The bear turned around and shouted "Heartbreak attack!" A black heart came out of it's chest at hit Takuya, causing him to slink onto the ground onto his knees.

"What's the point? We'll never catch him." he grumbled before breaking into tears and sobbing.

"Why are you crying? What happened?" Kouji asked. "I just feel really sad." was the answer that came from a crying Takuya.

"Takuya are you gonna be alright?" Keiko asked.

Suddenly Kouji was hit with a black heart as well. "What just hit me guys? I'm so sad. I feel like everything's so hopeless you know?" Kouji muttered, fighting back tears.

"Kouji? Kouji what's going on?" Keiko demanded.

"It's gonna be okay, we just have to go get Tomoki now." she added. "Keiko, you're such a good friend." Takuya cried, grabbing onto Keiko's left side.

"We're so lucky to have you." sobbed Kouji, grabbing onto Keiko's right side.

Another black heart hit Keiko in the back. "Ugh… I'm glad you guys are my friends too!" she said with a sob, before dropping to her knees, bringing Kouji and Takuya down with her, and sobbing.

"I love you guys!" she wailed.

"We love you too!" they wailed back in reply.

Suddenly they just stopped.

"Ugh! That attack is so unfair! And now Tomoki, is gone!" Takuya said.

* * *

"Why do evil things always run faster than normal things?" Takuya pondered aloud.

"I never really thought about it that way." Keiko said quietly in reply.

"I don't see it anywhere." Kouji said.

"This is all our fault, because we were fighting. This really reminds me of the time I lost my brother at the amusement park. I've never been so worried in my life until now." Takuya said.

"I know. Little kids are always getting in the way." Kouji said almost sympathetically.

"That's not what I meant! Man! You must be the most selfish kid in the world! Two worlds! We have a responsibility to take care of Tomoki because he's younger than us! Don't you take care of your own brothers and sisters?" Takuya exclaimed.

"I don't have any, happy now?" Kouji said in a low tone.

"Oh…" Takuya said quietly.

"You see, I don't know anything about having brothers." Kouji said, his tone softer and almost sad.

"Well, why don't you just pretend Tomoki's your brother?" Takuya suggested.

"And imagine what it would be like for a little kid to be lost and alone and afraid. And imagine you could keep him from feeling that way." Keiko added. Kouji's face was almost shining determination as he ran ahead to look harder for Tomoki. Keiko and Takuya smiled at each other briefly before they took off after Kouji.

* * *

After some long running the trio ended up running into the path of the flying robot. "Hey, that's the robot!" Keiko exclaimed.

"Hey, flying robot! We're looking for a little kid and a big bear, have you seen them?" Takuya asked. The robot nodded and pointed them in the right direction. They ran a short distance and saw a huge lavender castle.

"In that creepy castle?" Kouji pondered.

"How can it be creepy, it's lavender!" Takuya said.

"Never underestimate your enemy." Kouji said, running towards the castle.

"It's just so lavender." Takuya said, unable to get off that topic.

Keiko sighed, "Alright. It's lavender."

"Hey Tomoki!" Takuya shouted in hopes to get Tomoki's attention.

"Down here!" Kouji yelled.

"We're here for you!" Keiko yelled.

"He can't hear us, we'll have to go in." Kouji said. The three ran across the bridge towards the castle. Before they could react, it folded so that they would fall into the moat surrounding the castle. They were sinking quickly when a panda type digimon swam down and grabbed them, swimming them to an underground cave.

"Once again, I, Pandamon have foiled my fiendish foes, the shadowtoyagumon." it announced.

"Thanks a lot." Keiko said with a smile as she wrung her hair out.

"Great, thanks, so you saved us just do you could bring us here and hurt us yourself." Kouji growled.

"Buddy, why are you so paranoid?!?" Takuya demanded, "Don't pay any attention to him, thanks for saving us… Pandamon?"

"Pandamon the protector." Pandamon clarified. Pandamon explained that the Shadowtoyagumon started following Cherubimon and planning to go to the real world and get revenge on the kids who stopped playing with them. Pandamon then led them out and told them to stop the Shadowtoyagumon.

* * *

As soon as they stepped out of the cave they were attacked by the Shadowtoyagumon. "Ready Kouji?" Takuya called over.

Kouji nodded and the two evolved into Lobomon and Agunimon. "Keiko, get to the front steps of the castle, we'll meet you there." Agunimon said.

"Right. Good luck you two." she said, then managed to get past the Shadowtoyagumon in one swift movement. The Shadowtoyagumon all turned into a large tank and shot at Agunimon.

Lobomon pulled out his sword, "I'll handle this." he said gruffly. He jumped in the air and hit it in the back, making it turn back into several Shadowtoyagumon.

"Show off." Agunimon grumbled, "I could've done that."

"Yeah? Well you didn't." Lobomon growled.

"I would've done a better job." Agunimon said.

The Shadowtoyagumon turned into two large robots and started attacking the two.

"Takuya, follow my lead!" Lobomon shouted, running towards Agunimon and leaping into the air, jumping off of each other, causing the two robots to hit each other and transform them back into Shadowtoyagumon. Each of the boys took their data and devolved back into humans. They ran to the steps where Keiko was waiting and ran into the castle and up to the tower where Tomoki was being held. They could hear the sounds of Tomoki and the bear fighting. Immediately they opened the door and found Tomoki and the bear playing video games.

"Tomoki? What are you doing?" Kouji demanded.

"What's it look like I'm doing?" Tomoki asked cheerfully.

"But we thought you were in trouble." Takuya said.

"We were so worried." Keiko added.

"I know. I feel just awful about that guys, but this little trooper saw through to the real me and played with me anyway!" the bear exclaimed happily, "He's a good boy." it added, patting Tomoki's head.

"So can we keep him?" Tomoki asked. Kouji and Takuya sighed and Keiko giggled.

* * *

"Awww… Why can't we keep him?" Tomoki asked as they exited the castle.

"Oh fantastic friends," said Pandamon who was standing with all of the Shadowtoyagumon, who were now rainbow colored, "To make up for their monstrous mistakes, the Toyagumon insist they take you off the island."

"Yeah!" the four all shouted happily.

* * *

"A… A plane???" Keiko demanded.

"Well, yes, we can only get off by plane." the Toyagumon said.

"What's wrong Keiko?" Takuya asked.

"I-I just don't like planes, that's all." she said with a shaky voice.

"Why not?" Kouji asked.

"I just don't…" she said quietly, taking her seat next to Tomoki and behind Takuya.

"Don't worry Keiko. If you get scared, you can squeeze my hand." Tomoki said.

"No, no…" she took in a deep breath, "I-it's nothing…" she whispered. The plane took off smoothly and ended up a smooth ride the whole way through, but for some reason Keiko was relentless that something would happen.

* * *

I'm so glad I finished this chapter, I was waiting for this one because next chapter Keiko gets her spirit! Well, please read and review!


	9. Veenomon: Spirit of love

As you may notice I'm skipping episode 8 of Digimon, because nothing has changed. Alright, onwards! This one was a bitch to write, it took forever!!!

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon Frontier but she does own this plot and the character Keiko**

* * *

After finally being back together the eight walked through the forest, looking for a new place to stay, the sun looked like it was about noon, but everybody was looking to get camp set early. Keiko and Izumi were walking next to each other, giggling about something or another. "Hey, Takuya?" Tomoki said, "Do you think there's any bad Digimon in the forest?"

Takuya looked up for a second, "Maybe, but if there is than we could spirit evolve and take care of it." he said with a smile.

"I'm really getting the hang of my spirit now." Tomoki said enthusiastically.

"Well that's great buddy. I am too; I think everybody is, the way we fight, we should be experts in no time." Takuya said.

"Nobody can stop the Legendary Warriors!" Junpei announced triumphantly.

"Yeah!" Izumi shouted.

Bokomon looked at Keiko who was just staring straight ahead. "Keiko my dear, what's the matter?" Bokomon asked.

"Huh? Oh, it's nothing." she said, smiling.

"Keiko, if something's wrong you can tell me." Bokomon said.

"Well, I just-" she looked up and saw a huge wolf-like Digimon standing there snarling across the river. She gasped and fell backwards.

"Keiko? What's the matter?" She looked at Bokomon and pointed to the brush where she saw the terrifying creature. Bokomon looked over as did Keiko. "I don't see anything." Bokomon said. Keiko looked closely, it was gone.

"What's the matter Keiko?" she heard Izumi's voice in front of her.

"Nothing, I just-" Keiko tried to begin.

"Dear Keiko thought she saw something in the woods." Bokomon explained.

"Keiko? You saw something?" Izumi asked.

"Well, maybe, but I think it's all in my head." she explained with sigh.

"Oh, I see." she said, helping Keiko stand and continuing on the way. They were out of earshot from everybody else and Bokomon had walked away. "So Keiko, I never really got the chance to talk to you about everything." Izumi said with a smile.

"Everything?" Keiko echoed.

"Well, I mean you, your life, you know. Start with something easy like… You're family."

"Family? Well, that wouldn't really be easy, but… Well I was in a plane with my parents on our way home from London two years ago, and well, it crashed." Izumi gasped. "When I woke up I was in the hospital, with a horrible headache, and I just wanted to know where my mom and my dad were. And after about five minutes, they just came out and told me. My dad was dead on the sight, and mom died on the airlift. They called me a miracle. But I never thought of myself as a miracle, more like a death sentence. I don't dwell on the whole plane crash thing, because I don't exactly like getting sympathy. But my brothers took over Takishita corp. and-"

"Wait, wait, wait. You're _THE_ Takishita Keiko?"

"Not really, just Keiko. Now I live with my brothers, Naoki who's 20, Keiji who's 17 and Saburo who's 13."

"Aren't you sad at all? I mean you talk like it's nothing."

"Well, of course all I wanted to do was cry, but you've just got to move on, you know?" she said with a smile, "So, tell me about your family."

"Heh. There's not much to tell, I'm just an only child with normal parents I suppose. I mean I have a boring life. The only thing that's ever happened to me was moving to Italy for a couple years then moving back just last year."

"Well that's fun. Getting to go to Italy."

"But, you're Takishita Keiko, you could go anywhere with the snap of your fingers."

"Yeah. But it's not really that great."

There was silence before Izumi had a devilish grin, "Any boyfriends?"

"No."

"What?!? Why?!? You're totally gorgeous and you could get anybody you want! EVER!!!"

"I guess… But why would I worry about guys, when I have soccer and school and-"

"Oh right. I see. I think that I get it. But I have another question for you."

"Shoot."

"Why does Kouji act like that to you?"

"Well, he never really liked me from the start. I think there's something wrong with me, I mean he hates me. What did I do wrong?"

"Maybe it's not you; maybe it's just Kouji being Kouji."

"Maybe it is. I shouldn't worry about it much though, ne?" Izumi giggled, "You're really nice Keiko, I'm glad to get to know you."

"Me too Izumi, you're really-" Keiko looked across the river and saw the creature walk by the behind the brush. Keiko stared at the gray fur zoom by her eyes.

"eiko…Keiko… Keiko? You there?" Keiko looked at Izumi, "You alright Keiko?"

"I'm fine…" she said, smiling weakly. Takuya and the others crossed a bridge to the area where the wolf Digimon was. Keiko froze and wouldn't go across.

"Keiko? What's the matter?" Takuya asked from the bridge. Keiko shook her head and smiled, walking across the bridge with the others.

* * *

After walking for about another hour, the eight came to a village of sorts. Several Biyomon came out of the huts, looking at the children in amazement.

"Bokomon, what are these?" Keiko whispered.

"Biyomon." Bokomon whispered. She nodded.

One stepped forward, "You must be the legendary children they speak of! Please! We need your help!"

Takuya grinned, "Yes! Finally! Of course we'll help!" The Biyomon all cheered and jumped up and down.

* * *

"We hide our fractal code from the horrible creatures called the Wolfenimon. They have decided they want our fractal code for Cherubimon and will stop at nothing to get it. We have it hidden in this-" The Biyomon picked up a large green-gold jewel the size of about two or even three human heads, "We need to move the jewel to the sacred shrine, where the Wolfenimon will not be able to get their paws on it. The only problem is that if they saw us with it while we were moving it, we wouldn't stand a chance. There are five of them, and we would perish trying to stop them."

Takuya nodded, "Well you guys, we could do something like this: Kumamon holds the jewel and we make a straight run to the shrine. Beetlemon, Kazemon, Lobomon and I will guard Kumamon."

"But there's five of us, if these Wolfenimon are so and they could easily outnumber us." Kouji observed.

"Good point." Takuya muttered. This caused everybody to try to think of how to get the jewel delivered.

"I could hold the jewel." Keiko piped up. Everybody turned to her in shock.

"But you can't even spirit evolve." Junpei said.

"Well, I know. But if there's five Wolfenimon then you each take one and I run with it." Keiko said.

"Keiko, you sure you're up for this?" Takuya asked.

"I have to do something, I can't just sit around and be useless all the time." Keiko said.

"Keiko, you're not useless…" Tomoki muttered.

"Then it's settled! I hold the jewel and you guys block me, we can do this." Keiko said, grinning. Everybody nodded in agreement.

* * *

"Go!" Agunimon exclaimed. The five legendary warriors all ran from a bush, Keiko in the middle.

They ran at Keiko's pace when they heard a growl, causing them all to freeze. Keiko clutched the jewel tighter, hugging it to her chest protectively. Beetlemon got into an offensive stance, "Go guys! I'll get this!" he exclaimed.

After a nod from Agunimon the others ran through the forest to get to the shrine. Suddenly they heard another growl from behind, they looked behind to see another chasing them, "Pyro punch!" Agunimon yelled, aiming for the Wolfenimon.

It merely dodged it and went straight for the jewel Keiko was holding, its teeth bared.

"Hurricane wave!" Kazemon yelled, sending a gust of wind into the Wolfenimon, causing it to fall over.

"Blizzard blaster!" Kumamon exclaimed, hitting the Wolfenimon with snowballs.

"We'll handle this! Get to the shrine!" Kazemon yelled.

Agunimon, Lobomon and Keiko continued the journey to the safe zone for the fractal code. "Keiko! Go!" she heard Lobomon yell. She turned to see two Wolfenimon fighting with Agunimon and Lobomon. "Go!" he repeated in a strained voice.

Keiko nodded and sprinted through the forest, not looking back to the fight she had been forced to run away from. _'Why do I have to be so helpless? Why can't I don anything to help?' _she questioned herself as she weaved through trees. A snarl from right in front of her caused her to fall backwards, clutching the jewel as tightly as she could. The final Wolfenimon stepped from the bushes. Keiko looked around frantically as the dog type digimon snarled and stepped closer to her. "Help!!!" she screamed.

She dragged herself backwards and away from the beast, but it was too late. It leapt straight for her. Keiko got to her feet and ran away. She kept charging forward, running from the Wolfenimon behind her. Keiko suddenly felt something smash into her, knocking her to the side, causing her to barrel roll about five times before skidding to a stop. She turned to see Lobomon pushing against Wolfenimon with his light sword, "Keiko! Go!" he managed to grunt.

"What do I do?!? What do I do?!?" Keiko said panic stricken.

"Go! Get out of here!" he yelled. Keiko scrambled to her feet and ran away. She ran away, but went behind a tree not far away.

She heard Kouji's voice groan and peered from the tree to see Kouji underneath one of Wolfenimon's huge paws. It's bared teeth were going closer to Kouji's face by the second. Keiko picked up a rock the size of her fist from the ground and threw it into Wolfenimon's head. "Leave him alone you ugly thing!!!" she screamed.

It spotted the large gem in her hand and lunged towards her. Keiko scampered out of the way and ran away from the Wolfenimon.

She ran until she was at a huge cliff with a waterfall. She gasped and turned to find a way out, but was faced with the huge wolf digimon. She stared into it's dark eyes as it sauntered closer to her. "Keiko! Run! Go!" Kouji yelled from the distance. Keiko looked around for a way to run, but had no way. The Wolfenimon lunged towards her and her reflexes automatically caused her to step backwards and off the cliff.

She flew down the cliff, still clutching the jewel and shut her eyes tightly. _'This can't be it. Whenever I try to help all I do is ruin things, I can't even guard a little jewel!' _she thought to herself as she fell to her death. Keiko wrapped her arms tightly around the jewel, "No!!!" she screamed.

Suddenly the jewel glowed magnificently, causing her to slow down and eventually stop in midair.

She opened her eyes and saw she was in a completely dark area, standing on her feet. The crystal floated from her hands and dissolved around an odd shape, a figure appeared in front of her, shaped like a heart with wings. She pulled out her D-tector and collected the figurine into it.

"Execute, spirit evolution!" Keiko was wrapped in light, the same as the others when they evolved, "Veenoman!" The new Keiko floated into the air and back onto the cliff side. Veenoman had long blonde hair to her back, she wore a Roman type dress that went to her waist and short white boots. She had brilliant green eyes and had small white wings, about the size of two hands outstretched and next to each other.

The Wolfenimon lunged at her almost immediately. "Love shot!" she exclaimed. A gold bow appeared in her hands and she shot a gold arrow at the Digimon. It fell onto it's side and then ran back to her.

"Love shot!" she yelled again, hitting the Wolfenimon in it's forehead, causing it to turn into a digiegg.

Veenomon devolved back into Keiko, who was sitting on her butt, looking shocked. Kouji pulled himself to his feet, and looked back; the others had seen everything and looked shocked, too. There was dead silence for literally five minutes.

"YES!!!" Keiko yelled, jumping to her feet victoriously, "I did it! I did it! Did you see me?!? I'm not worthless after all!" she jumped up and down excitedly.

"Keiko, you were never worthless to begin with." Takuya interjected.

"You were always strong, just because you couldn't digivolve didn't mean we thought you were worthless." Tomoki added with a smile.

"If you couldn't digivolve even now, we would still love you!" Izumi exclaimed.

"Yeah, and you being able to digivolve only means you can kick ass with us now." Junpei said.

"Thanks you guys. That really means a lot." Keiko said quietly, sniffling.

"EWW! DON'T GET ALL EMOTIONAL!!!" all the boys yelled.

"Awww Keiko!" Izumi squealed. Izumi and Keiko ran to each other and hugged, talking about emotions and such.

"Tell us when you guys have it out of your system." Takuya mumbled, walking away with the others.


	10. Tomoki's nightmares

* * *

"I believe the forest kingdom begins beyond that track." Bokomon stated.

"Sure looks big." Takuya pondered.

"Hey Bokomon! How much longer do we have to walk to the forest terminal?" Junpei asked in a whiney voice.

"Don't worry you should only have to walk a little bit more." Bokomon answered.

"A little bit more?" Junpei sighed and hung his head, "These little bits are killing me!"

* * *

The sun had begun to set and Izumi, Kouji, Keiko and Takuya ran down a hill. Keiko tripped over her own feet and slid down the hill on her stomach. "Man, isn't it time for a dinner break? I'm wasting away here!" Junpei whined.

"We didn't even get any breakfast yet!" Tomoki added.

"I think we better stop here and make camp." Takuya said.

"It's been a long day." Izumi said as she helped Keiko to her feet.

"Yeah, it's getting late." Keiko said as she casually brushed the dirt off of her shorts.

"Yeah. Whatever." Kouji muttered.

"Are we stopping?" Tomoki asked excitedly.

"Does that mean I get to eat? And lay down? And EAT?" Junpei asked dreamily.

Izumi suddenly walked off, "Look what I found!" she said holding up an apple, "I hope it's edible."

"It's called a meat apple, each one has the flavor of a different meat." Bokomon explained.

"Where'd you find that thing?" Takuya asked.

"It was just lying on the ground, I'm sure there's more laying around somewhere." Izumi said pointing in a certain direction. Bokomon, Neemon and Tomoki went with Izumi to find some more meat apples.

"Well, I guess we'd better gather some firewood." Takuya said to the others, as they headed in another direction.

"I'm not gonna have to lift anything heavy am I?" Junpei asked.

* * *

After finally making a roaring fire and putting their meat apples on the sticks the children all sat around the fire, exchanging thoughts. "Hey Bokomon, anything in your book about a beast spirit?" Takuya asked.

Bokomon opened his book and flipped through the pages, "I'm afraid not." he said with a sigh. Neemon rubbed the page of the book. "Paws off baggy!" Bokomon snapped.

"But I think I found something! This page seemed to be folded over. Maybe there's something on the other side." Neemon said in his high, nasally voice.

Bokomon heeded his words and flipped the page, revealing more about beast spirits, "It's a miracle. You're actually right." Bokomon said sarcastically before reading the page, he explained that there are two spirits, a beast spirit and a human spirit.

"Well, if Bokomon's right, each of us should be able to get a beast spirit." Kouji pondered aloud, staring into the fire.

"But if that's true, then we're only half way there." Izumi said.

"Oh man! It's like starting over!" Junpei groaned.

"Do you think it would all go in the same order?" Keiko asked.

"There's no telling." Kouji said still staring into the fire.

"Bokomon, Bokomon." Neemon said poking Bokomon, and saying ow when his paw got swatted away.

"But if we get our beast spirits, maybe we can get Grumblemon." Tomoki said, his green eyes lighting up.

"Well, I'm willing to give it a try. Beast Spirits, here we come!" Takuya said excitedly.

"Is this a good idea?" Neemon asked, after poking Bokomon again and getting his paw swatted again.

"Are you mad? Of course it's a good idea! We have to help you find your beast spirits as soon as possible, that may be the only way to save the digital world!" Bokomon exclaimed.

"Nope, not good." Neemon said.

"WHAT is not good?" Bokomon growled.

"The meat apples, while you're talking they're getting all burnt up!" Neemon exclaimed. Everybody hurled themselves towards the meat apples, taking them off of the fire.

"Mine's like a meat bun!" Junpei exclaimed.

"Mine's like a chicken drumstick!" Tomoki chimed in.

"I think I'm eating prime rib!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Mmm. Yeah. Gingered pork!" Kouji said, letting out a rare happy expression.

"I got Onigiri!" Keiko said, grinning.

"Mine's Osobuko!" Izumi exclaimed falling to the ground excitedly.

Suddenly thunder rolled and clouds covered the light radiating from the moon. "Something's happening." Tomoki said wearily. They walked over to the trees as television screens appeared.

"Whoa!" Izumi exclaimed.

"A bunch of them." Takuya said.

"That is pretty sweet." Kouji added.

"What are these Bokomon?" Keiko asked softly.

"This is the T.V. forest, they are video gateways into the human world." Bokomon answered.

"It's my school." Izumi said softly, "It never looked so pretty to me. Oh, look! The cherry trees are blooming." Izumi said.

"I love cherries. You know I actually love anything edible. Hey is this pre-recorded?" Junpei asked in a jumble of phrases.

"Look that's my house!" Keiko said with a gasp, running over to a tree. Takuya and Kouji looked over Keiko's shoulder with a gasp, the house was huge!

"That's your house?!?" Takuya stammered.

Keiko's eyes fell, "Yeah." she whispered.

"That's the park where my mom used to always take me to play." Tomoki said, standing in front of another tree. "My mother!" Tomoki cried. Everybody gasped and ran over to Tomoki's tree.

"You weren't kidding. Your mother's very pretty, Tomoki." Izumi said.

"Yes, she is. You have her eyes." Keiko said in admiration.

"Oh, mom." Tomoki whispered. The sky began to clear, causing the televisions to disappear. "Wait! Where are you going? Don't leave me! Please! Momma!" Tomoki cried out, before breaking down into sobs.

* * *

Kouji sat against a tree while the others sat around the fire. "I bet my mom is really worried about me." Izumi said quietly. Keiko hmmed and pushed her face closer to her knees.

"Cheer up little buddy, try my meat apple, it's hot dog." Takuya said, handing his meat apple to Tomoki. Tomoki took his meat apple and took a bite out of it.

"Tomoki could be your little brother." Izumi said, smiling.

"Hey Kouji, are you falling asleep?" Takuya called over to him.

"Sleep? I'm lucky I'm not bored to death." Kouji said, turning away from the group.

"Hey bud! What's your problem?" Junpei shouted. "He needs a nap." he growled.

"He's just grumpy. Hey Junpei, maybe Tomoki would like to see a magic trick." Izumi said, walking closer to the others.

"Magic? Since when?" Takuya asked.

"Since I was a kid myself!" Junpei said, "Ladies and germs, I give you the magic of Howie Doodat!" he exclaimed. A magic show went on in which Junpei connected small scarves by pushing his hands together. After the show, the children were giggling about something or another. Tomoki walked to the fire to take his meat apple. A blue-purple essence went into his ear, unnoticed by the others.

* * *

After Izumi, Keiko, Bokomon, Neemon, Kouji and Tomoki fell asleep, Takuya and Junpei stayed up talking about siblings, when suddenly something rushed above the two. Takuya let out a gasp and looked above himself. "What? Did you just see a ghost?" Junpei asked.

"I saw something, but I don't know what. I just have the feeling we're being watched." Takuya said, standing alert.

"Maybe it was just a squirrel or something." Junpei said.

"No. I can't believe you didn't feel something just then." Takuya said, looking around the forest.

"I did. But I think it was just gas from eating all those meat apples, if you know what I mean, and I think you do." Junpei said grinning widely.

Suddenly Tomoki began moaning in his sleep, causing Kouji, Keiko and Izumi to wake up and look over to him. Tomoki dreamt that his mother drifted away from him and that the other five children were trying to hurt him. Tomoki stood up, holding a smoking stick from the meat apples. "Tomoki what is it?" Izumi asked.

Tomoki started chanting: I won't forgive you.

"There's something wrong with him." Takuya said.

"Tomoki? Is everything alright?" Keiko asked.

Tomoki yelled that he would never forgive them and spirit evolved to Kumamon. Kumamon started stepping closer to the five frightened children. "That's one angry bear." Takuya said.

"Kumamon what the hell's wrong with you?" Junpei growled.

"Tomoki, what's the matter? Please you have to stop." Keiko said.

Kumamon froze a tree, causing it to snap in half feet away from the children. The five all began to flee the area, they went down a hill and hid behind trees. "He's gone completely crazy!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Tomoki, I'm really sorry." Junpei pleaded.

"Crystal freeze!" Kumamon shouted, freezing another tree. It snapped in half and was heading straight for Izumi.

"Zumi!" Keiko shouted. Takuya grabbed Izumi and tumbled out of the way, landing on top of her.

"You okay?" Takuya asked.

"Yeah, thanks." Izumi sighed.

Keiko, Kouji and Junpei all ran the other way. "Hey! How come Takuya gets to fall with Izumi?" Junpei demanded. Keiko and Kouji ran away from the area they were standing in.

"Run you jerk!" Kouji shouted as he and Keiko ran. Junpei ran out of the way, ice replacing where he was standing.

"Looks like the only choice we have is to spirit evolve and take him out!" Junpei exclaimed once everybody was united.

"Spirit evolve? I won't do it, there has to be another way to stop him!" Takuya said.

"Right!" Izumi exclaimed. "Sorry Junpei, I'm with them." Kouji said.

Keiko nodded, "I could never hurt Tomoki."

"Fine! Well what do you propose?" Junpei inquired angrily.

"Crystal freeze!" Tomoki shouted, sending a blast of ice towards Takuya, Keiko and Kouji, who dodged.

"Run!" Kouji shouted.

"Come on Izumi, take my hand! I'll protect you!" Junpei said breathlessly as they ran, only to trip over himself and for Izumi to run him over.

"Oh! I'm so sorry!" Izumi exclaimed, blushing.

Kouji, Keiko and Takuya meanwhile were hiding behind trees again. Something flew through the forest. "Did you see that?" Keiko gasped.

"What was it?" Kouji asked.

"I don't know, but I definitely heard something that time." Takuya said.

"Right." Kouji said, taking out his D-tector.

Keiko nodded, "I'll keep the others sane." she ran off to Junpei and Izumi.

Kouji spirit evolved to Lobomon and kept Kumamon away from Izumi, Junpei and Keiko. He raised his sword in the air and illuminated the forest so that Takuya could see the digimon behind it all. Takuya spirit evolved and prepared to battle the warthog digimon.

* * *

From this point to then end, nothing at all changes, so I'm going to skip to ze end!

* * *

After finally being put into a restful sleep, the children were all snoozing on the forest floor, all but Kouji. Kouji got a message on his D-tector that he must find his beast spirit, sending him off on his own.

* * *

I'm not going to be writing the next few episodes, so be forewarned that there is a huge gap. I am going to skip one episode past the Whamon one, to the point where a certain brunette gets her spirit. Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, read and review! (I'm at a loss, I've been favorited by people who have never even reviewed once. Puzzling, ne?)


	11. Chikarimon

Hello, hello, hello! Another chapter of Digimon Frontier Refreshed! This one is pretty damn intense, so make sure you've got a change of pants.

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon, but she does own this plot's chapter, Keiko and all the Keikoness involved.**

* * *

"Whamon, can we please stop?" whined Junpei.

"We'll never get there if we keep taking worthless rest stops." Kouji growled from the other side of Whamon's mouth.

"Kouji you don't have to be a jerk all the time." Izumi spat from another corner.

"Izumi, please don't yell." Takuya said quietly.

"I'm NOT yelling!" she bellowed.

"Izumi, please stop being cranky." whimpered, then looked terrified at the fact that he stood up to a furious Izumi.

"I'm NOT cranky!" she screamed.

"Guys. Please stop being so melodramatic. Why don't we take five minutes? " Keiko said from another side of Whamon. There was a mutter of agreement in the group and Whamon changed course for another island not far away.

* * *

The island was quite large. It had a strange cliff in the middle of it that was about 100 feet tall. The six children climbed up a rock that was 10 feet from the ground. "Wow, this place is beautiful!" Izumi exclaimed.

Junpei grinned, "Wonder if there's any food here."

Keiko walked to the edge of the mini cliff they were on, "I think I see a fruit tree up there." she said pointing to the tall cliff, "If you get close to the edge, you can see-" she was cut off by her own shriek as she fell off the ten foot tall cliff.

"Keiko!" Izumi yelled, running over to try and catch her.

Suddenly Keiko bounced back up with a shriek. "What did you do?" Kouji asked.

Keiko went down then up again, this time landing on the cliff. "I-I don't know." she said breathlessly. They all looked over the edge to see odd purple flowers shaped like stars.

"What are those Bokomon?" Takuya asked.

"They're bounce lilies. Anything that lands on them bounces up with no problem, they're quite entertaining, actually." Bokomon said. The bounce lilies went from where they were to around the huge cliff, the ground was covered in them.

"Wow, there's so many." Tomoki said.

"Keiko, didn't you say that there's some fruit up there?" Izumi asked.

"Yeah, they're at the top." Keiko said, pointing to the top once more.

"There's probably food everywhere. We could all split up and look for some." Kouji said.

Everybody nodded. "I'll go up the mountain, I could fly someone up with me." Keiko said.

"Can I go Keiko, I want to fly!" Tomoki said eagerly.

Keiko giggled, "Sure, Tomoki."

"I'll go with Izumi!" Junpei exclaimed. Izumi laughed in response.

"I'll go with Kouji then." Takuya said. Kouji complied with a nod. Keiko spirit evolved into Veenomon and flew up to the top of the cliff with Tomoki in her arms.

* * *

After devolving Keiko and Tomoki looked around the cliff. It was circular and only about 30 feet long. There was a large tree in the middle full of fruits. "Wow! Look at all of them!" Keiko exclaimed, they pranced over to the tree excitedly. Keiko stood on her tip toes, trying to reach the fruits on the tree. She jumped up and down several times, but she was too short to reach. "I'm seriously vertically challenged." Keiko said turning around and grinning at Tomoki.

It was true, Keiko was the second shortest of the group, standing taller than only Tomoki himself. Tomoki's eyes suddenly widened, "Keiko!" he shouted.

Keiko turned around quickly only to be hit with a black tentacle and to be whipped into Tomoki. They sailed backwards, Keiko managing to grab the ground and holding them steady. Tomoki was already shaking in terror. Keiko positioned Tomoki behind her, both of them sitting, but Keiko sitting between Tomoki's legs. "Who are you?" she demanded.

"Warrior of time. Callomon. It seems that i have found the human children they speak of." it answered in an ancient voice.

Tomoki pulled out his D-tector. Suddenly a black tentacle came from Callomon's long brown robe and whipped the D-tector from Tomoki's hand. It flew out of his hand and down the cliff, landing on the ground with a springing noise. Keiko looked backwards to see the bounce lilies below them, causing the D-tector to bounce safely. "Nice try young one, just for that you'll have to watch your friend die first." it snarled.

A black tentacle came from the robe and latched around Keiko's foot pulling her a bit. "Keiko!" Tomoki yelled, clutching onto her.

"Tomoki, don't think, just listen. You have to let go of me." she whispered as she held on, Tomoki reluctantly let go. "Now, close your eyes." she whispered quickly as she held on from being pulled away. He did as she told him. She grabbed both of his feet, which were by her legs, and pushed them. He was sent spiraling off of the cliff.

"KEIKO!!!" he screamed as he fell, landing on the bounce lilies safely.

The tentacle dragged her over to Callomon. It was about to slash her with it's sword but she rolled out of the way too fast. It grabbed her around the waist and smashed her into the ground. Keiko cried out in pain as she was dragged along the rocks. "Pathetic human." Callomon growled, "You possess the spirit of love. The weakest of them all. Leaving it to a pathetic human was the most idiotic thing that Ophanimon could do." it snarled.

Callomon smashed her against a tree and let her go, leaving her against the tree. "Please don't." she whimpered. She backed up against the tree, "NO!!!" she yelled.

The tree began to glow and before Keiko could blink her eyes she changed into a beast spirit. "Chikarimon!" she exclaimed when the transformation was complete. She had long blonde hair down to lower back, a red bathing suit top with red bottoms long gold boots and gold wings that were quadrupled in size. "Cherish beam smash!" was the phrase that sent shivers up everybody who was on the ground's spines.

Everybody heard Tomoki's and Keiko's shrieks of horror and gathered at the bottom. As soon as Tomoki landed everybody was in panic as to that was going on the top. The cliff top suddenly exploded.

"Keiko!" Kouji screamed in terror.

A figure came down from the top floating gently down.

"Keiko?" Tomoki whispered. The beautiful creature's expression was contorted with anger.

"Keiko. Are you alright?" Junpei asked.

Chikarimon screamed with rage, "Passion punch!" she yelled, slamming her fist down in the area where the children were. They all scattered in time to see that the punch sent shockwaves through the earth.

"Keiko! Stop!" Izumi screamed.

"She can't control it! We have to stop her!" Takuya yelled.

Everybody spirit evolved, save for Takuya and Kouji who beast spirit evolved.

"Keiko stop it!" Kazemon yelled.

Chikarimon pointed to Kazemon and a gold beam came from her finger causing Kazemon to dodge. "Keiko!" Takuya screamed. Chikarimon turned to glare at Takuya, her beauty was merged with absolute fury.

"I'll get her!" Beetlemon yelled, he jumped onto Chikarimon and wrapped his arms around her neck, trapping her in a headlock. "A little bit of help here guys!!!" Beetlemon grunted as he held onto the horrible beast spirit. Kazemon grabbed on around her waist and Kumamon around her legs.

Chikarimon let out a scream of pure anger, and in a flash of gold, Kazemon, Beetlemon and Kumamon were sent flying in different direction. They all devolved to their human forms, conscious, but too weak to transform again.

"I've never seen anything like that!" BurningGreymon exclaimed.

"You've got that right!" KendoGarurumon yelled in reply, as Chikarimon looked like steam would come out of her nose.

"Wildfire Tsunami!" BurningGreymon shouted, sending a fire twister straight for Chikarimon.

Chikarimon simply leapt over the attack, landing on her feet gracefully. She flew straight for BurningGreymon, her eyes glowing a spiteful red. KendoGarurumon collided with Chikarimon in mid-air, sending her to the ground. She got up, her eyes becoming impossibly redder.

"Keiko! This can't possibly be you!" Izumi shouted.

"Keiko! Please snap out of it!" Tomoki yelled.

"You're going to kill them!" Junpei yelled. Chikarimon glared at the three children and hissed.

"Keiko, stop this now!" KendoGarurumon yelled, causing another hiss from Chikarimon.

"I remember our Keiko being gentle and nice!" Izumi shouted. Chikarimon froze and blinked a few times. As soon as the personality changed came Chikarimon turned back. She looked at BurningGreymon and pointed towards him. In a flash of gold, he was in his human form.

"Takuya!" Junpei yelled running to his side.

Takuya was apparently alright, "Get her Kouji! Bring Keiko back!"

"Howling star!" KendoGarurumon yelled, charging for Chikarimon.

"Passion punch!" Chikarimon yelled, charging straight for KendoGarurumon. There was an explosion of silver and gold light.

"Kouji! Keiko!" Tomoki screamed. As the light disappeared, a disturbing sight was in front of the children: Kouji being held up by the collar of his shirt by Chikarimon.

"Keiko, please." Kouji groaned, "Fight it. This isn't you…" Chikarimon only stared at him. "Keiko, it's me. You can do it Keiko." Kouji said again.

"Keiko! Listen to him! We're not trying to hurt you." Takuya shouted.

Chikarimon let him go and backed up. "Good Keiko. Fight it! You can do it! It's hard to control! But you can do it." Takuya said.

"Takuya?" Chikarimon said quietly.

"Yes, it's me." Takuya said, looking quite relieved.

Chikarimon on the other hand looked horrified. She put her shaky hands in front of her face and howled in agony. She devolved to reveal a silent Keiko with her hands tangled in her hair. She was breathing frantically. "No. no. no. no…" she whimpered.

"Keiko?" Izumi said quietly.

Keiko shook her head in denial, "I-I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" she gasped before fleeing into the woods, Bokomon and Neemon pursuing her.

"Keiko!" Takuya shouted after her, he began to run, but was stopped.

"No, give her some time." Izumi said. Takuya nodded solemnly, "Right."

* * *

Keiko had been wandering the woods for quite some time. She stared down at the forest floor, not able to stop herself from walking. Bokomon finally built up the courage to speak.

"Keiko?" he said quietly. Keiko kept walking as if she didn't hear him.

"Keiko, you have to stop." Bokomon said again. She didn't listen.

"Keiko, I know you're scared, but-" he stopped because she suddenly froze in her tracks.

She just stood there looking down. Her upper body started shaking, then she dropped to her knees and buried her face in her hands, sobbing audibly. "Oh Keiko." Bokomon said quietly, rubbing her shoulder soothingly.

* * *

Dum dum dummmm! Cliffhanger!... Well... Mostly... Kinda.... Sorta... A little. Fine, not really. Anyway reviews would seriously make my life worthwhile. Please reviewww! (I can already count on you though Celestialwriter. Because I love you!!)


	12. Lost

Just to warn you this turned out horrible. Sorry!

**Disclaimer: KairiTakishita doesn't own digimon but she owns this plot and Keiko and her Keikoisms.**

* * *

People tend to tell me I'm a good person. Some say I'm a nice girl. Others say that I'm a klutzy emotional wreck. But honestly, I try. I try as hard as I can to be quite honest. I've learned to block out the negative, but sometimes it never works.

When people whisper "Oh there's that snobby rich girl" it hurts. Especially when you've never talked to them. It hurts when people say your worthless, or that you're as pathetic as a lost puppy, that hurts too.

I believe in second chances though, and consequently, I've given far too many. I've been stabbed in the back, used and psychologically abused. People take me for granted far too much. Just because I'm nice to them, they think I'm just a weak little girl. I'm not, I'm really truly not weak. I've lost all faith in everyone. I can't trust people, because I'm so afraid. Just the thought of leaving my fate in somebody else's hands scares the shit out of me.

But no, Keiko will get over it, she's a Takishita after all! How can they say that? Nobody truly knows me. I've raised myself. I've taught myself how to cook, clean, play soccer, ride a bike, rollerblade, play volleyball, everything. I never had a mother to tell me how to handle my emotions and how to do makeup. I've never had a father to tell me that I need to work on my goal shooting or that dating is for suckers. My older brothers are all I really have. They aren't a mother or a father, but they are something important to me. I guess that I never trust because they never trusted me first.

I suppose I could understand if people don't trust me anymore. Especially after what I've done. I injured them all, if it had gotten farther than that… I don't know. I lost control, and it's so scary to know what could have happened. No matter how hard I try, things just never work out for me. Am I just not enough for anybody? Well, now I know for a fact I'm not. I almost killed my own friends. I don't even deserve to… Shit.

* * *

I made my way slowly back to the battle site, I already sent Bokomon and Neemon on their way a couple of hours ago. I hope they still let me stay with them. I hate being alone. I heard a scream suddenly, sending shivers up my spine. "Zumi?" I whisper. I start to all out sprint back to everybody.

I saw everybody standing there, looking around frantically. "Guys!" I shouted running over as fast as I could. I suddenly bumped into something. Well, bumped isn't the word, more like smashed, slammed, creashed… Well it sure hurt as hell. It was a glass sort of thing. I stood up and put my hands out touching whatever I hit. It was a force field or something. I saw Izumi running over to me as fast as she could.

"Keiko! Keiko help!" she screamed.

I stared at her in shock, "Zumi? What's wrong?" I called into the glass.

"Get us out! Callomon did this to us!" she screeched in terror. I noticed the glass getting farther away little by little. I looked behind the glass and saw there was another layer of glass coming closer. They would be crushed.

I spirit evolved and tried to kick the glass open.

"Love shot!" I yelled, an arrow hitting the glass and bouncing off of it.

"Affection harp!" I yelled, a gold harp appearing in my hand, then shooting a gold beam at the glass. It did nothing once again.

"Keiko! It's no use, you need to beast spirit evolve!" Kouji shouted.

"No, I can do it!" I squealed.

"Love shot!" I yelled, hitting the glass with another ineffectual arrow.

"Keiko! You have to!" Tomoki yelled.

"No!" I shrieked.

"Love shot!" Nothing was working.

"Please! Keiko please!" Junpei yelled.

"I-I can't!" I yelled.

"Affection harp!" Nothing.

"Keiko! Yes you can! Please do it now!" Takuya screeched. I stared at them for a second.

I can't let somebody die again.

"Slide evolution!" I shouted reluctantly. I felt my shape changing, becoming larger and more powerful.

"Chikarimon!" I stared at the glass and gasped for air, trying to contain control.

"Keiko! You can do this!" Tomoki yelled. I saw the glass was only about two feet from hitting them.

"Passion punch!" I shouted, slamming my fist onto the glass like wall. It sent a huge crack throughout the wall. "Cherish beam smash!" I shouted, hitting the wall with a beam. It illuminated the dark forest, shattering the glass walls in one shot. I let out a sigh and devolved into myself again. My horrid, evil, nasty self.

Izumi ran over and hugged me tightly, "I was so worried Keiko!" she gasped.

I nodded and buried my face in her shoulder. "I'm sorry." I mumbled. I looked up from her shoulder, my eyes just clearing it. "I'm sorry you guys. I'm really sorry." I said.

"Keiko, it's not like it was your fault." Tomoki said. Why don't they hate me?

"You couldn't control it, it's normal." Junpei added smiling. I hate pity.

"You didn't mean to do it Keiko, dear." Bokomon said. No.

"And you saved us after all!" Neemon exclaimed. And if I didn't?

"You're new to this, I lost control too Keiko." Takuya said comfortingly. Please stop it.

"We all had trouble controlling it." Kouji said in his naturally cold voice. Even Kouji pities me.

"No that's not it!" I yelled pushing myself away from Izumi. "I lost it! I completely snapped! I almost killed you guys! And you're standing here making me feel better! You _should _be dead right now!" I stamped my foot to the ground and shut my eyes tightly. "Sometimes I just can't- UGH!" I screamed. I dropped to my knees and sat on the back of my feet, staring at them. "I just don't want to lose the ones I love again." I said absent-mindedly. There was silence.

**Izumi POV**:

If Keiko knew just how great she was. If she knew how sweet and funny and nice ad caring and adorable she was, she wouldn't be this way. Keiko has no idea how much she means to me, to us. She's my best friend. One of Tomoki's role models. Junpei's advice giver. Takuya's buddy. She's even a companion of Kouji. Keiko has no idea. She's such a great edition to this team.

She balances us, she keeps us sane, she makes us smile.

I walked over to her and kneeled in front of her, "Keiko, you know you're better than this. You mean so much to us. We could never hate you. So what if you had a hard time? We all do. You're one of the sweetest people I've ever met, you should give yourself more credit. Thank Gods for people like you." she stared at me intently, her bright blue eyes giving off a creepy but beautiful hue.

"Thank you Zumi." she said, finally smiling.

* * *

Well that surely sucked. Eh, it happens. Anyway **PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE **review!


	13. The beach

I have a poll on my page, please do it. Right now, I'm in the process of writing the six voyages of Keiko. It's going to be a series of friendship oneshots used to establish her relationship between everybody, just so you get an idea. Also I am writing an IzumixKeiko oneshot for those interested. Woo hoo! Okay, on with it!

**Disclaimer: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon, but she does own Keiko and the little voice in Keiko's head.**

* * *

As Whamon swam away into the distance, the children all waved goodbye to him. "See ya buddy!" Takuya shouted.

"Aloha!" Tomoki, Junpei and Neemon all yelled in unison.

"Ciao Whamon!" Izumi exclaimed. Whamon dove under water and out of sight.

"So, there he goes." Kouji said nonchalantly.

"Nice of you to point out the obvious." Takuya said, matching his tone.

"Don't be such boys!" Izumi squealed, triumphantly climbing to the top of the rocks.

"My dear Izumi, what's gotten into you?" Bokomon asked.

"You can't blame a girl for feeling good on such a beautiful day, especially a girl who got her spirit back!" Izumi exclaimed, holding her D-tector proudly.

"Let's not forget who has their beast spirit now!" Junpei added. _'Yeah, let's not forget.' _Keiko thought to herself.

"Let's hear it for Junpei! The princely beast of thunder!" Izumi yelled.

"And Izumi, princess of the summer breeze!" Junpei added once again.

"And Takuya, King of I'm gonna be sick!" Takuya said with sarcasm.

The children walked along the beach, looking around. "You know, I can't help but notice it's summer. And we're at a beach." Junpei said.

Izumi giggled, "I noticed that."

"You know what that means." Tomoki said, grinning.

"Summer vacation!" Everybody exclaimed in unison.

"The waves!" Tomoki shouted.

"Shell hunting!" Izumi said, holding up a starfish.

"Sand!" Keiko squealed, throwing sand into the air.

"Lots of sunshine!" Junpei bellowed.

"Yeah! Put it all together and what do ya got? The beach, bay-bee!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Takuya, aren't you forgetting something? We're on a mission here. We'd be stupid to let out guard down." Kouji said, his tone cold as usual.

"Come on! Lighten up buddy." Takuya said, getting next to him and tickling his side.

"Yeah! Stop being a party pooper." Junpei said, tickling his other side, causing Kouji into a fit of giggles.

"Wait, wait! Don't! I'm not guys!" Kouji exclaimed, laughing. "I just think that-" he couldn't continue because of his extreme ticklishness.

"Yes you are. You're just being pooey." Tomoki whimpered. Kouji's tickle torture ceased, and he looked guiltily at Tomoki.

"It can't hurt to take a short break, we've earned it." Izumi reasoned.

"We haven't been able to relax since we got here." Keiko added.

"They're right!" Junpei and Takuya collaborated.

"Fine, whatever. I'm obviously outnumbered here." Kouji said, sighing.

"Then all in favor say I!" Izumi shouted.

"Aye aye!" Everybody said in unison. (They tend to do unison speaking a lot, ne?)

Suddenly Neemon squealed and everybody looked in his direction. "Look over there!" Bokomon shouted.

The children made their way to the beach house Bokomon pointed out. "What's summer vacation without a beach house?" Izumi inquired.

"This is a little to convenient." Kouji said, furrowing his brow.

"I don't know about that, but it sure looks comfortable." Tomoki said dreamily.

Four toucan-like digimon called Toucanmon hopped out of the beach house, "Welcome!" they shouted.

The Toucanmon welcomed the kids to the beach house and made them a huge meal, which the children ate quickly. After finally finishing, they were completely stuffed. "My tummy. Feels like. A melon." Takuya said, rubbing his stomach with a grin.

"Tomoki did you get enough?" Izumi asked. Tomoki nodded with a crooked smile.

"Oh, enough? And more!" Junpei said, holding his gullet.

"Well, I guess it's time to split!" Takuya said, standing up.

The Toucanmon were oddly against the idea of the children leaving, yelling about some sort of summer special. A string was pulled and a curtain opened to reveal all sorts of summer wear. The children couldn't help but to impose, and in a matter of minutes they were all running for the beach yelling, "BONSAI!!!" Each of them wearing a swimsuit. Kouji wore a dark blue pair of trunks, Keiko wore a metallic silver top with orange bottoms, Takuya was wearing red trunks, Tomoki was wearing a pair of green trunks and Junpei was wearing a pink and yellow man suit. (I don't know how else to explain…)

* * *

**Keiko POV:**

Neemon laid in the sand as I patted the large mound of sand on top of him. The sand was extremely warm as I sat on my knees. "Are my ears getting burnt?" he asked.

"Nope!" I exclaimed as I finished. "I'm all done, is this okay?" I asked.

He nodded, "Thanks!" I stood up and proceeded to make another sand castle, decorating it with pink shells I found. Suddenly a scream tore through the calmness of the afternoon. It was Izumi. I looked at the guys and saw Takuya and Junpei running over. This was bad, 1. Because Izumi screamed while in the changing room, the _girls' _changing room. 2. Um, they're _boys._

"Guys! Wait!" I shouted. They ran right by, kicking sand in my face in the process. I rubbed my eyes and stood up, running over to the changing room. "Guys! Don't!" I yelled. It was too late. They were too oblivious to realize this was not a good idea. I heard another Izumi scream and heard Takuya and Junpei shout. Kouji, Tomoki and myself just stood outside, disbelieving.

About ten seconds later Takuya and Junpei came out, red marks all over their face. They stumbled over to the deck, us following. "I told you it was a bad idea." I said, sighing.

"But she was in trouble." Junpei said defensively.

"It's alright, it's not really your guys' fault anyway." I said, offering a smile.

We stood in the cabana, waiting for Izumi to come in. It was dead silent.

"So… Did you guys see what happened? Was she hurt?" I asked. Junpei shrugged.

"I'm not sure, we didn't see… much." Takuya said, red rising on his cheeks.

"Ah…" I said. Silence once again.

"Junpei. Your nose is bleeding." Kouji said suddenly. We all looked to see blood running down Junpei's face. Takuya and I started laughing out loud, while Kouji tried to stifle giggles.

"That's not funny!" Junpei shouted.

"Why is his nose bleeding?" Tomoki asked. It was silent for a moment before Takuya started laughing hard again.

"Well Tomoki, when-" he began.

"Don't tell him!" Kouji and I yelled.

"This is downright embarrassing." Junpei muttered as he cleaned off his face.

Izumi walked into the room, fully clothed, "I'm so sorry!" she said sheepishly.

"So? What happened? Why did you scream before?" Kouji demanded.

"Because someone's a peeping tom!" she exclaimed.

"What?" I shouted.

"You're kidding!" Takuya said in disbelief.

"Let me at the creep!" Junpei growled, standing up and apparently recovering from the nosebleed ordeal. We all eyed Junpei suspiciously. "Why's everyone looking at me for?" he demanded.

"You must admit, it looks suspicious. After all, you are the most likely culprit." Bokomon said matter-of-factly.

"He makes a good point Junpei. Why don't you just admit it?" Takuya asked, putting a hand on Junpei's shoulder.

"Because I didn't do it that's why!" Junpei shouted.

"Guys, it couldn't have been Junpei, he was with us the whole time, remember?" Tomoki chirped.

We all nodded, "Sorry Junpei." I muttered.

"We all have the same alibi." Kouji said furrowing his brow.

"We were all within sight of each other the whole time." I added, thinking about who it could have been.

"Then by the process of elimination, it was no one?" Bokomon said.

"Are you calling Izumi a liar?" Junpei demanded.

"Of course not Junpei, it's obvious we're not alone here." Takuya said.

"Of course not Einstein, did you forget the Toucanmon?" Kouji said, rolling his eyes.

We ended up searching the whole entire cabana, only to come up empty handed. "Shit!" Kouji yelled suddenly, running to the changing room.

"What is it?" I yelled after him.

"Our D-tectors!" he shouted back.

Everyone gasped and headed to their baskets of clothes. I ran into the girls' locker room and looked through my basket at least five times. I ran into the boys' locker room open doorway and leaned against the frame, still finicky. "Mine's gone too." I said, after hearing them talk about missing D-tectors.

"What do we do?" Tomoki asked in panic.

"How could you let them trick you like that?" Bokomon asked.

"Stop it! They fooled all of us!" Kouji yelled, infuriated. I nodded and ran into the girls' locker room, stumbling on my own feet. I began to change out of my bathing suit and into my clothes when I heard Junpei and Takuya yell: "Get out!" and Izumi scream shrilly. At this point, I don't even want to know.

* * *

After finally getting dressed, we followed the footprints of the Toucanmon, hoping to catch them. And luckily we did. We heard them belt out a song, "Oh Ranamon the ravishing!" they all sang in unison. Actually, it was really weird.

"Alright! Hold it right there you thieves!" Takuya yelled as we got nearer to the Toucanmon. "Just what do you mean by Ranamon the _ravishing_. Huh?" he demanded.

"Give our D-tectors back now!" Kouji growled. It was actually sort of scary when Kouji was angry. He seems so viscous.

"No way, no how! These little babies are ours for the keeping! And you can't take them from us, so scram! " a Toucanmon shouted.

"Maybe we should be the ones scramming." another one said. They all suddenly ran away in the blink of an eye.

"Hey come back here!" Tomoki screamed.

"This is so dumb!" Takuya yelled as we sprinted to catch the Toucanmon. Out of nowhere huge splashes went through the ocean.

"What's happening?" I yelled.

"It's Ranamon!" Bokomon yelled.

Waterspouts were everywhere, surrounding a creature standing on one of them. It was a green human like Digimon with a blue bathing suit type of costume and red eyes. I've actually thought that Ranamon was very pretty, but she was evil, so that was sort of a moral no-no. "Hi y'all!" she yelled, waving.

"She's the warrior of water and very evil." Bokomon said.

"Well of course she is!" Takuya shouted.

"She has some lousy timing." said Kouji from in front of me.

"What a pleasant surprise, I have been looking so forward to seeing you all again. I'd hoped to have my beast spirit to show y'all, but everything happens for a reason, we can't have everything. Now, just be good little children and hand over your spirits. I'd love to stay and chat, but frankly you've bored me to tears. Now, how's that sound?" she said, smiling.

Izumi looked pissed off, "Sounds stupid to me!" she sneered.

"But we don't have our D-tectors!" Kouji interjected.

"We can't do anything." I said, looking at Izumi. I was afraid she would get hurt if she fought alone.

"I'll handle her!" Izumi said.

"But Izumi-" Junpei tried.

"Don't worry Junpei, I'll take care of her in no time!" Izumi said, glaring at Ranamon.

"Goody, goody. This is gonna be a treat!" Ranamon exclaimed, making huge water twisters everywhere, causing sand and wind to hit us violently.

"Izumi! Be careful!" I shouted over the deafening sounds. She spirit evolved to Kazemon in a flash and prepared to fight.

* * *

After several bad attempts to get to Ranamon, Kazemon was verbally abusing her. We couldn't hear it, but we could see her waving her arms wildly and her face contorted in serious anger. Ranamon suddenly froze and dove into the ocean. Honestly I had no idea why, it looked like Ranamon was winning; there would be no reason for her to retreat. The water began to glow brilliantly and we heard horrible cackling. "It's all over now, honey! It's too bad, I was actually starting to enjoy our little spat!" came the echo from the light.

"What's happening?" Kouji asked in a shaky voice.

"Ready or not, here I am!" the voice screamed. The light disappeared and a wall of water shot up. There was this horrible ugly creature standing in front of us. It was her beast spirit. She said something about being radiant and I almost laughed, _almost_. She then said something about a closer look at her, but I wasn't exactly listening, I was too shocked at her appearance.

"Keiko!" I heard somebody shout. I didn't even notice her stampeding this way. I ran in the direction of the others and out of her path, Kazemon ended up intercepting her.

"Are you stupid? You could've been hurt!" Kouji shouted.

"Sorry… Didn't mean it…" I said breathlessly.

He grunted and we watched the battle pursue. Kazemon was on the ground and Calmaramon was about to finish her off.

"Titanic Tempest!" she shouted. She began to spin, but then she lost control and spun across the ocean, screaming the whole way.

"What happened?" Takuya asked.

"Yeah, where'd she go?" I asked as well.

"Looks like Calmaramon is just as bad at controlling her beast spirit as you two." Bokomon said.

"Way to bring that up." I said in a dark voice.

"Yeah, that's real nice." Takuya growled.

"So that means we're okay?" Junpei asked.

"You guys, what happened to the Toucanmon?" Izumi asked, walking up to us.

"Oh no! They're gone!" Tomoki said with a sigh.

"Shit! I forgot all about them." Junpei sighed.

"Those feathered fan boys still have our D-tectors." Takuya said angrily.

"Yeah, we- Wait, what? Feathered fan boys?" I asked.

"Well, yeah." Takuya said looking at me like I was stupid.

"Oh, just wondering if I heard right, that was a little…" I trailed off.

"Yeah I know, I needed some innuendo." Takuya said, sighing, "Well, let's go get them!" he then shouted as we all ran after the Toucanmon.

* * *

Well, that was delictable. Thanks for reading, and please review and do my poll!


	14. Zephyrmon, beast spirit of wind

Another chapter. It's really fun to write in Kouji's point of view. I think I'll do it more often. Anyway do my poll and whatnot. Muahaha.

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon, but she does own Keiko and all her Keikoisms.**

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* * *

****Kouji POV:**

It had been a while since the Toucanmon disappeared and we all decided to take a break-after Keiko fell into a ditch, Tomoki stubbed his toe and Junpei was clamped on the backside by a crab. "It's no use! We'll never find them!" Takuya yelled, laying back on a bench. Tomoki and Keiko were sitting next to each other on the bench as well, Junpei was in the sand, and Izumi and I were standing.

"Junpei? How's your… You know…" Tomoki asked. "I don't wanna talk about it." Junpei said, heaving a sigh. Heh, I wouldn't want to either if I got my ass clamped by a crab and needed an eight year old to take it off.

"Let's just take a break for a while." yawned Takuya. Yeah, take a break and waste time, great idea. Junpei let out another whiny sigh, _again. _That kid sure can complain.

"Hey, don't worry about it. We'll get your D-tector in no time." Izumi said softly to him. Yeah, baby the guy.

"Huh? Did you say something Izumi?" Junpei asked.

"Junpei, weren't you thinking about your D-tector?" she asked in confusion. No. He was fantasizing about the bathing suit incident, he's into scrawny legs, curveless hips and flat chests. Izumi is so vain, it drives me insane. Then she gives Keiko these angry looks, like she's jealous.

"Ah. Well, I was wondering if… You'd be like that." he said.

"Huh? Be like what?" Izumi asked.

"Well, you know. Like Calmaramon." Junpei said with a gulp.

Takuya jumped up from his laying position, "Huh? Calmaramon? Where?!?" Baka.

"I was just wondering if you'd be scary like that…" Junpei trailed off. I conjured up an image of Kazemon, then an image of Izumi in a bathing suit. Ouch, that's one ugly beast spirit.

"STOP IT! I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU GUYS WOULD EVER THINK SOMETHING LIKE THAT!!! I'm nothing like her!" Izumi shrieked. Of course you aren't Izumi, your voice is much more annoying.

"Of course." Neemon said.

"Hey! Say that like you mean it!" Izumi yelled in his face. How can he if he doesn't?

"He's not saying you're evil or anything, just that beast spirits are hard to control." Takuya said.

"Yes, remember what happened to Takuya and Keiko?" Bokomon said. Keiko shrunk down a bit when he said her name. Apparently she's still guilty about the whole almost killing everybody ordeal.

"Yeah, I do. And Keiko's beast spirit was beautiful! Meaning that mine can be too! I will always be a cool and beautiful girl Digimon! That I know." Izumi said, flicking Neemon in the nose.

"But how?" Tomoki asked.

Izumi shoved her fist in the air triumphantly, "Because I'm a girl! And girls know how to handle power when they need to." Izumi shouted.

Keiko sighed quietly, apparently Keiko couldn't handle power. Tomoki and Junpei looked scared. Yeah, girls sure are annoying as hell. Izumi's always talking about girl power and manners and shit. It gets real old. At least Keiko can keep her trap shut. Too bad she's overly helpful and has an inferiority complex.

"Scary!" Neemon shouted.

"Knock it off! Having power does not make you scary!" Izumi screamed.

"Jeez, you sure?" Takuya challenged. Keiko looked over at him and grinned.

Hmph. Power made Keiko scary.

Takuya looked up suddenly, "Hey! It's the Toucanmon!" he yelled. I looked up and saw them too, they were flying through the air.

"Where are they going?" Tomoki asked. They landed on an island across the ocean.

"Don't let them get away, we'll swim over!" Takuya shouted, running to the water.

"I'll race you there!" Izumi yelled, running next to them.

Keiko looked at me with shock written all over her face. She knows they won't make it as well.

"Tomoki, you guys wait there!" Takuya yelled back, then suddenly tripped and fell in the water. Izumi spun around. Some sort of weird Digimon popped out of the water and was talking to Takuya. A bunch of other ones were there too, all talking about something.

They all came up to shore and talked about horrible whirlpools, bad earthquakes and not being able to get home. I wasn't listening, I was too busy watching Keiko draw in the sand with her foot.

"So you're saying there's no way to get across, huh?" I asked. I didn't care about their sob story. I wanted to know if we could get across or not. The answer was if we could fly. We thanked them and Takuya, Keiko and I devised a way to find a flying Digimon to take us there.

We noticed Izumi making a speech to the Gomamon about being sad, friendship, yadda yadda yadda. Izumi then made the decision that the Gomamon would come with us. No. No way in hell would that work. "Izumi, that might be too dangerous." Keiko said gently.

"Keiko! Don't say that! You're supposed to be the optimistic one in the group! You can't say that! We have to help them!" Izumi yelled in her face.

Keiko looked a bit startled and moved away from Izumi a bit more, closer to me. "We can't even help ourselves! I mean, we don't even have our D-tectors anymore, what good are we?" I snapped.

Izumi gasped, "That's a great excuse if you want to give up, but I'm not going to! Sure it's tough. But I believe we can do whatever we put our minds to!" Izumi preached. Izumi kneeled down to the Gomamon and said encouraging words to them. "I hope this works, if it doesn't we'll make it work." Izumi said.

I'm almost touched, Takuya, Keiko and I stepped forward.

"Izumi's right, we can help each other out. We'll make it together." Takuya said.

"Even if we don't have our D-tectors we can make it as a team." I said. I actually want to help them a little.

"Yeah, just like you said before Zumi, we have to put our minds to it." Keiko added.

"You mean it? Really?" Izumi gasped.

"I can't swim well, and I'm afraid of water, but count me in!" Tomoki said.

"Hey finding flying Digimon is too much hard work anyway." Junpei said. Leave it to Junpei to add lazy into our list of flaws.

"Then it's decided!" Bokomon said.

"Guys!" Izumi squealed.

"Don't start crying, because then Keiko will start crying, then Tomoki will start crying…" Takuya said.

"Yeah, and I will if they don't." Junpei said.

"Lets get to work then!" Izumi squealed.

* * *

Yeah, _let's_ get to work. Izumi of all people should be doing the most, but no. 'Ooh, I'm a girl, girls don't do that!' Yeah, if that's true then why's Keiko dragging trees around with Takuya. And Junpei's making a stupid plan in the sand. Even Tomoki's pulling his weight! We finally got the boat in the water and were heading straight for the island. We were hit by a huge tidal wave and once we were all clear we saw Ranamon standing on water.

"Hi kiddy pies!" she said, waving.

Izumi got all hormonal and went and spirit evolved and ended up getting knocked into the whirlpool.

"Zumi!" Keiko yelled, "What do we do?!? What do we do?!?" she cried out hysterically. Keiko and Izumi were very close apparently.

Junpei almost ended up jumping into the water, but I ended up holding him back.

"Zumi!" Keiko yelled out again.

"Izumi!" Takuya shouted. Keiko looked like she would cry.

"And here I thought I would get the chance to test out my beast spirit, it's really not fair." Ranamon said with a sigh.

"You're toast lady!" Takuya screamed.

Ranamon got up and stretched and yawned, "Thanks, but I already had my breakfast… Hey! Maybe I can test my beast spirit on y'all!" Ranamon said.

"Takuya look!" Tomoki said, pointing to a whirlpool, which had begun to disappear.

Izumi emerged from a huge wall of water.

"Izumi!" Takuya yelled.

"It's Izumi!" Junpei shouted.

"Zumi! You're back!" Keiko squealed, obviously relieved.

Izumi pulled out her D-tector and beast spirit evolved into Zephyrmon.

"Whoa!" Takuya shouted. Junpei looked absolutely amazed.

Alright, girl-wise, I can understand that Keiko's beast spirit was good looking, but considering that Izumi transformed into that… It was a huge improvement. Izumi isn't horrible looking I suppose, but her attitude makes her ugly. Well I'm sitting here judging the girls on looks, Ranamon got knocked into the water.

"All right!" Tomoki yelled.

"I'll say." I said.

"She's doing it!" Keiko shouted.

"She's controlling her beast spirit!" Takuya gasped.

"She's amazing isn't she Junpei?" Tomoki asked. Junpei was over there making goo goo eyes at Zephyrmon. Yeah, I was right, big improvement.

Ranamon slide evolved to Calmaramon and spat acid at Zephyrmon repeatedly, until she turned and spat acid towards us. Zephyrmon got in the way and deflected it. Some acid hit her wing and it dissolved it a bit. Calmaramon then wrapped Izumi in a tentacle.

"That bitch!" Takuya yelled.

"We can't even do anything!" Tomoki shouted.

"Stop it, let her go you scum queen!" I yelled.

"Yeah, you ugly fish head!" Junpei yelled.

"What did you say?!?" Calmaramon demanded.

"You heard him!" I shouted when Junpei backed away like a coward. "If we call her names, she'll be distracted and let Zephyrmon go." I mumbled to the others.

"You slimy, dateless wonder!" Takuya yelled.

"You big coward!" Tomoki shouted.

"You ugly, hormonal, jealous wench!" Keiko screamed. Wow. That was… harsh.

Calmaramon took that one to heart, "What did you say you little brat?" she screeched, she let go of Zephyrmon and it gave her the chance to attack her. Calmaramon got knocked into the water.

"That's for picking on my friends." Zephyrmon said.

"Yeah! And tell your friends that they'll get more of that if they mess with us!" Takuya yelled.

Calmaramon got up and screamed some profanities out to us, only I couldn't hear it because Tomoki, Junpei and Takuya were all screaming at the fact that Calmaramon had green splotches all over her face. That really made her mad, she used her Titanic Tempest thing, but like before flew away into the distance.

"Looks like somebody was having trouble controlling her beast spirit." Zephyrmon said.

We finally got the Digimon back to their friends safely.

"Izumi, this is all thanks to you, if you didn't have the courage, none of this would be happening." Bokomon said.

"Hey Izumi, how were you able to control your beast spirit?" Takuya asked.

"Well, just luck I guess." Izumi said.

"Not because you're a girl?" Tomoki asked.

Keiko looked pissed, "Hey! Just because you're a girl doesn't-" she was interrupted by Izumi, who ignored Keiko, "Well yeah, maybe, but I'm not telling. A girl's gotta have… Secrets!" she squealed making a kissy face.

"You feel a sick as I do right now?" Takuya asked.

"No, I'm sicker." Tomoki moaned.

"Guys!" Izumi whined.

"Me too!" Neemon yelled.

"KNOCK IT OFF!" Izumi screamed.

The Gomamon then came up to us and thanked us. "You should be thanking Izumi." Takuya said.

"Yeah, she's the one who did everything." I added.

Suddenly Izumi wrapped her arms around the both of us, "You guys helped me more than you know!" she said dreamily. Ew, ew, ew, ew, ewwww!

"Cut it out." I groaned. This was disgusting.

"Hey! Keiko needs some lovin'!" Keiko exclaimed. Izumi giggled and hugged Keiko as well. Thank you Keiko.

"What about us!" Tomoki and Junpei shouted, causing Izumi to soil them as well.

"Hey did you guys see the Toucanmon?" I asked.

"They're gone." a Gomamon answered.

"What?" Keiko asked.

"They all left for the Autumn Leaf Fair." another one said.

Great, just fucking great. Another stupid adventure to go on.


	15. Head Trauma and Freebird

Wowzers, 15 chapters already. I can't believe it!

**Disclaimer: Digimon? I dont own it. Keiko? I certainly do own Keiko.**

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****Kouji POV:**

We sailed across the long river smoothly on our way to the Autumn Leaf Fair. "Wow! This is working great! We should got to that Autumn Leaf Fair thingy in no time!" Takuya shouted. He had his goggles over his eyes to block out the winds. Takuya sat on the left of the boat, next to Bokomon. I sat on the other side of Bokomon and in front of Izumi. Tomoki sat in the barrel that was against the sail, while Keiko sat next to the barrel with Neemon leaning against her. Junpei sat in the back, holding onto the sail.

"Let's hope so." Bokomon said.

"And let's hope the Toucanmon are there." Tomoki added. He suddenly groaned and I turned around, Neemon was asleep on Keiko's lap. "How can anyone sleep at a time like this?" Tomoki asked.

Keiko grinned, "Only Neemon."

The river released into a large body of water with blocks of ice in them. It was really weird, because just a few seconds ago it was warm.

"Man, we're really cooking now!" Takuya said. Cooking? Who says that? It was freezing outside.

"Maybe cooking isn't the right word." Takuya said, holding onto his arms.

"More like freezing." Keiko said shakily, holding Neemon closer to her in an attempt to warm up.

"Yeah, I can't feel my fingers." Izumi said shakily. Complaints, complaints.

I took off his sweatshirt an handed it to Izumi, "Here, use this." I said.

"Gratzi! You're the best!" Izumi said, grinning. Yep, I'm the best.

Tomoki looked panic stricken, "Neemon you can't sleep in the cold you'll freeze to death!" he shouted. Neemon popped up and looked around frantically, causing us all to sigh.

"Hey look at that!" Bokomon said, pointing in front of us.

"What are we looking at?" Junpei asked.

"Land ahead!" Bokomon shouted. There was snow, like seriously a lot of snow all sitting on the ground. We went over a hill and were in mid-air for a moment before crashing back to the ground, still going along the snow quickly.

"That was way better than I thought it would be, but where's the autumn fair thing?" Takuya asked.

"It should be just up ahead." Bokomon said. He said that ten minutes ago.

"Well, there is something up ahead." Izumi said. We all looked up.

"But it doesn't look very fair!" Izumi shouted. Bad pun.

It was a huge embankment. Everybody started to lost their heads and started screaming. Leave it to me.

"Everybody hold onto something so we don't fall off the raft!" I yelled. Everybody grabbed on tightly to parts of the boat and we flew over the hill. The sail broke off but we were still gliding along.

"It's not over yet!" Tomoki yelled. Then we saw it. A fucking snowman. Naturally we crashed right into it and we all ended up on the ground.

There was complete silence and then, "Shit." It was Keiko. But it was warm.

"Hey, it's warm here." I said, touching the grass.

"Warm? But how?" Keiko asked.

"Maybe that!" Takuya shouted, pointing to a huge boiler in the middle of a town square.

"It's the fair thingy!" Takuya yelled triumphantly. Duh.

Izumi gave me back my sweatshirt and we walked over to the fair. "I hate crowds." Bokomon said with a sigh.

"Even if the Toucanmon are here it'll be like finding the tiniest needle ever in a million haystacks." Izumi groaned.

"Well then, we better get looking." Takuya said. Yeah, let's go Mr. Optimistic.

* * *

After looking for two dreadful hours and finding NOTHING, I was pissed off. I ran down an alley and met up with Takuya. "Nobody's seen them, you have any luck?" Takuya asked me.

"No. Nothing." I growled, hitting my hand with my fist, "Those dumb birds probably traded those D-tectors and left."

We looked over to the left and saw a ton of Digimon standing in a circle clapping, there was music coming from it. "Who's over there?" I asked. Takuya shrugged and we walked over to see what it was.

We pushed through the crowd and we saw it. There was a sign that said _'Will dance for information on Toucanmon.' _I sighed. It had to be Keiko.

We looked and was her tap dancing with great speed, spinning around and occasionally slapping her feet with her hands. She was actually really good. "Wow! How is she doing that?" Takuya asked.

She stopped and Digimon began to clap and cheer. "Alright, alright! Now, who's seen the Toucanmon?!?" Keiko yelled. Nobody answered. "Nobody?" Keiko moaned. There were mumbles among the crowd. "Oh man!" Keiko squealed and sat down on the curb angrily.

The crowd cleared away and we walked over to Keiko, "That was a bad idea." Keiko sighed.

"Well… It wasn't terrible…" I said. She shrugged.

"Where's you learn to do that?" Takuya asked.

"Eh, I took dance for a while." she said, smiling.

"It was cool." Takuya said.

"Thanks." she said, "But it didn't help."

We heard somebody mutter, "Another plate." from a huge tent.

"Is that Junpei?" Takuya asked.

The crowd around the tent was chanting "Eat, eat, eat!"

We went over to the tent and saw Junpei take a bite of curry the lean back and belch. "I'm finished!" he moaned.

"Junpei!" Takuya yelled.

"What are you doing?" I demanded.

"Well, I thought that the Toucanmon ate here and it turns out they did and then I saw that sign." he said pointing. The sign said that whoever eats 30 plates gets a fantastic prize.

"Junpei, we're supposed to be looking for the D-tectors, not stuffing ourselves!" Keiko scowled.

"Yeah, but finding is tough work and I had to keep my strength up. Plus I thought the Toucanmon paid with the D-tectors and that they were the prize, well at least Izumi thought that." he said.

"Izumi?" Takuya and I said in unison.

"Where is she?" Keiko asked.

"More food!" came Izumi's feminine voice.

We looked over and saw Izumi scarfing down food. Keiko stared at Izumi disgustedly, "She'll get sick if she eats like that!" Keiko said.

"Izumi ate all that?!? Where does she put it all?!?" Takuya shouted.

"Well, she is a growing girl." I said.

We walked out of the tent still in shock, "30 plates…" Takuya moaned. We all made sick faces and groaned.

"Hey!" Bokomon yelled, he ran over with Neemon.

"I was looking for the Toucanmon and I saw Tomoki leave town!" Neemon yelled.

"What?!?" we all demanded at the same time.

We all sprinted to the snow covered areas and ran up the hill where we saw Tomoki walking slowly towards us. "Tomoki? Tomoki!" Takuya yelled running over to him, all of us hot on his trail.

Tomoki looked up and saw Takuya and ran into his arms. They were both on their knees in the snow, "Hey, what's wrong?" Takuya asked gently. Tomoki looked up at him, his lips began quivering and then he pushed his face into Takuya's chest, crying. Takuya held onto him tightly and Keiko looked at Tomoki, looking like she felt horrible.

Tomoki explained that he found the Toucanmon an they fell through the ice and he saved them, hoping that he would get their camera for a trade for our D-tectors. But once he saved them they took the camera and ran away. Takuya and Keiko told Tomoki he did the right thing, and now the only thing we could do was regroup and find another way.

We made our way back to the fair, when a huge explosion suddenly rocked the earth. We all ran over to the source of the explosion to see Petaldramon and some sort of robot Digimon.

"Keiko, Tomoki. Go." I said through my teeth.

Keiko stared at me, "What are you going to do?" she asked.

I picked up a long piece of wood and Takuya picked up a long piece of metal. Her eyes widened, "No. No, you're not going to do this! You guys'll get hurt!" she exclaimed.

"Don't worry about it Keiko." Takuya said.

She took in a breath, about to say something, but I stopped her, "Look, we'll be fine, now get Tomoki out of here." I said.

She looked at me for a moment with pleading eyes before she sighed, "Come on Tomoki." she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him to the robot Digimon.

Petaldramon turned and noticed the two of us. "Oh, this'll be good." he said. He charged for us and Takuya and I both leaped up and smashed him on the head. He glared at us and knocked us to the ground, on our backs.

He was about to take another swipe at us, but something caused him to pause. Keiko jumped onto his arm and bit into it, _hard._ Petaldramon cried out in pain and flicked her through the air. She ended up smashing her head on a horizontal pole that had once been a part of the building. She fell to the ground about a foot away from us.

"Keiko!" Takuya and I yelled in unison. Petaldramon took the opportunity to try and hit us, but some sort of large white thing pulled him away by his tail.

"What the hell is that?" Keiko groaned. I had no idea she was even conscious.

"Are you alright?" Takuya asked.

She gave us a crooked smile, "Dandy." she muttered. Man, she's out of it.

"Keiko, can you walk?" I asked.

"No means no Kouji, I already told you." she muttered, still smiling. Yeah she's definitely out of it.

"Help me move her Takuya." I said, we both slung one of her arms around our shoulders and pulled her over towards the others. She was singing 'Baby Come Back' in a high pitched voice the whole time.

"She hit her head." Takuya said as we sat her down on the ground in a sitting position.

"Let me take a look." the robot Digimon said, looking at her forehead. She looked at him and grinned, "If I stay any longer, would you still remember me? 'Cause I'm as free as a bird nowww." she chirped. She's insane.

"Keiko snap out of it!" Takuya yelled, he clapped his hands in front of her face loudly. Bad idea.

Keiko clutched the sides of her head in pain, "Aww! FUCK! She screamed, she glared blue irises at Takuya, "What'd you do that for?" she demanded.

"You were being weird!" Takuya said defensively.

"That was mean!" she yelled back. Yeah, she's really not herself, she never gets angry or yells.

Suddenly we saw that Korikakumon was dancing, "There's something you don't see every day." I said.

The robot Digimon was now wrapping a bandage around Keiko's head. "He can't control his beast spirit, he sure looks funny." Takuya said laughing.

"Not as funny as you two looked trying to beat up your friends." Bokomon said. I feel bad for them, Everyone keeps bringing that whole ordeal back up, I say it's over and done with now. The robot Digimon gave the three of us our D-tectors, saying we needed to help our friend.

"No thank you." Keiko squeaked.

"Eh, Keiko you stay, we'll handle it." Takuya said.

We spirit evolved and released Korikakumon from his ivy binds. He pushed Petaldramon up the snowy embankment and we left him to take care of it himself, which worked out well, because Tomoki came back cheering about kicking plant butt. We all regrouped, thankfully Keiko was back to normal and Izumi wasn't fat from all the food she ate.

"Molto Bene!" Izumi praised when Tomoki explained what happened.

"I'm just glad I didn't lose control and hurt my friends." Tomoki said.

"Why does everyone have to bring that up?" Takuya asked in an annoyed tone.

"Yeah, that's so not cool." Keiko said, sighing. Our D-tectors started beeping and Ophanimon spoke to us, she said that we need to go to the Rose Morning Star, and then it cut out. It pissed me off badly. I wanted to know. We all ended up using the tickets Izumi won from the eating contests to take a train to the Rose Morning Star, finally, we were making progress as a team.

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All of you people who add me to favorites and alerts... You **confuse me when you don't review**. You're not scared are you? I think you are. Anyway do my **poll** please!


	16. Lovely festivities

THANK YOU SO MUCH TO CELESTIALWRITER!!! WITHOUT HER THIS CHAPTER WOULD NOT EXIST!!! This is dedicated to her.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. Celestialwriter made up the main jist of the plot and I added mini details. I do own Keiko.**

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**Keiko POV:**

We sat on the trailmon for a while, waiting to get to the Hamburger Village. I was sitting with Izumi and Tomoki, chatting about the eating contest, while Bokomon pulled off the rest of my bandages from the Autumn Leaf Fair.

"Look!" Neemon suddenly squealed. We all went to the train windows and saw a huge city with a large castle in the middle.

"Wow! What is that Bokomon?" I asked as the wind blew my hair around.

"Looks like a festival to me." Kouji said, looking in our direction.

"Can we stop and see it?" Tomoki almost begged.

"Yeah! It looks so fun!" I squealed.

"We were just _at_ a festival." Kouji said.

"Yeah, but this one is probably evil-Digimon-less." Takuya said.

"And there's probably food there!" Junpei shouted, grinning.

"Whatever." Kouji growled, crossing his arms. We all squealed and stopped at the festival. As we stepped off the Trailmon we absorbed the amazing atmosphere of the festival. Everything was a gold, pink or a red color and there were heart balloons everywhere. All the shops around had pink, white and red flowers everywhere. There were also figurines of an angel all over the place.

"This is great!" Izumi exclaimed.

"I wonder how many Digimon are here." Takuya said, cocking his head to the side. We walked past many shops, seeing the same angel figurines.

"I really want an angel figurine, they're so adorable!" Izumi squealed.

We kept walking when I saw a store front selling the figurines, "Look!" I shrieked. I ran over to the front, leaving the others behind. I ran and ran, not really looking where I was going, when I slammed into a tall Digimon. I was flung backwards and I fell onto my butt. "Oh, I'm sorry!" I gasped, looking at the Digimon I bumped into. It turned around, it was in a Kabuki costume and had a giant flower mask on her face. Her hands were made of large flowers and her arms were thorns. She stared at me intently. Just staring, it made me feel super awkward. I couldn't look at her face, I was pretty embarrassed, I was sure my face was all red. She grasped me by the shoulders and picked me off the ground in one swift motion.

"Please, look into my eyes for a moment." she said urgently in her velvety voice. I hesitantly looked into her eyes. I don't know if I was more shocked or confused, but either way, I did it. I felt like her eyes were melting me, she was staring into them like a blind man seeing the sun for the first time.

"The great spirit." she whispered.

"Huh?" I managed to choke out. Where are Izumi and the others?!?

"You are the spirit of love, no?" she asked, still staring at me.

"Well, yeah, but how did you know? I've never seen you in my life." I babbled.

"Your soul is filled with the same love as the great spirit's." she said. I need the others badly right now, because I'm as scared as hell.

"Um… Well my friends are spirits too." I said. Haha, now they have to come over here!

"Yes, but they're not the great spirit." she said, still staring at me. I noticed there was a crowd surrounding us, they were whispering frantically to each other. "The great spirit? The great spirit?" they mumbled, staring at me. Oh my God, where are my friends? "The great spirit is here!" the Digimon announced, raising my arm into the air. The crowd began to cheer loudly. Music began to play and the Digimon pushed me towards the castle, "I'm Kabukimon." she whispered softly into my ear.

"Where are we going?" I asked.

"The festival is beginning." she answered.

"What?" I asked. I heard somebody shout my name and looked around for whoever said it. I couldn't see my friends, and I was scared.

* * *

**Kouji POV:**

"Keiko! Keiko!" I yelled as I saw the Digimon all corralling her towards the large castle in the middle of everything. "Where are they taking her?" Takuya shouted over the noise.

"I don't know!" I shouted in reply. We all squeezed through the crowd trying to catch up to Keiko.

"Keiko!" Izumi screamed. We were so close when Keiko got dragged into the castle and the doors closed behind the Digimon.

"Wait!" I shouted, lunging for the door. About 3 flower type Digimon stepped in front of me. They looked like roses, and they were in defensive positions. "Rosemon, guardians of the love kingdom." Bokomon whispered.

"Nobody may enter until the great spirit queen is ready." one of them said, staring intensely at me.

"Queen?" Izumi asked.

"Yes, the queen is inside, preparing to begin the festival." another said.

"What are you talking about? Who's a queen?" I snapped.

"The spirit of love. The young girl who just entered with Kabukimon. She's the great spirit of love. She's the reason we're having this festival." the third Rosemon said.

"Wait a second, she can't stay here forever, she's with us." Junpei said.

"If only for a day, we need a queen. She will go back with you when the festivities are over. Now please, leave the premises, the queen will make her grand entrance with nobody in this area. You may change into more appropriate attire for a festival of this sort, there are clothes in a hut only four stores away." Rosemon said.

"We'll leave if you can promise that nothing will happen to Keiko." I snarled. The three nodded. I spun around and followed the others towards the crowds again.

Izumi talked me into changing into some festival wear, a dark blue kimono. Izumi was squealing about what kind of kimono she should wear. Times like these that I wish Keiko was here. We hears loud cheers and ran to the main square. "Now announcing, the great spirit of love!" a voice boomed, sending more cheers throughout the crowd.

Keiko stepped forward from the huge group of followers. And she looked… So different. Her hair was slightly curled at the ends, she was wearing a pink kimono with red gold and white hearts all over it. She looked… Great. I've never seen her like this at all, the crowd started heading into an open almost dance like area where red, gold and pink lanterns were hanging, illuminating it. The Digimon were dancing around with each other, spinning around the floor to the music playing. I saw that Tomoki was dancing with a Floramon and Izumi was giggling as she danced with Junpei, who was making goo goo eyes at her.

I made my way through the crowd, searching for Keiko. I saw her sitting in a head chair looking around smiling softly. She looked like she would be bored sitting there so I walked up to her. "Hey." I said.

She looked up at me like she was shocked to see that I wasn't screaming in her face. "Hi Kouji." she said, after she regained herself.

"Are you alright?" I asked, staring at her.

She nodded, "Yeah, it's just kind of weird, you know?" I can only imagine. "Well I mean, Kabukimon is really nice, she's very kind. But I've just never really been the center of attention at all, especially at a love festival. And it's a little nerve racking to see all these couples twirling around the floor like Fred Astair and Ginger Rogers. I'm worried that some Digimon will come up and ask me to dance." she said, looking up at me as she said the last part.

I looked around and saw it too, but I also saw something else, coming this way. That something was Takuya, looking like he would ask Keiko something. Maybe to dance with him. Hell no. I'm not going to lose to Takuya. Not a chance. "Keiko. You wanna dance?" I asked quickly.

"Uh, okay I-" she didn't get to finish her sentence because I grabbed her arm and pulled her into the middle of the floor. Once we were well hidden in the crowd I panicked. Minamoto Kouji does not dance. Let alone with a girl, a Keiko girl.

"Kouji. What's wrong?" Keiko asked, staring up at me.

"Nothing's wrong." I said. Alright, I'd better do this. I grabbed Keiko's left hand with my right hand and put her arm on my shoulder. Now here comes the hard part. I let my arm snake around her waist, trying not to get too… Close to that… I pulled her a bit closer so that we were only a foot away. She stared at me with a smile when we began to move around on the dance floor.

"I didn't know Minamoto Kouji danced." she said with a laugh. Neither did I.

"There's lots of things you don't know about me." I said.

She nodded. "Well, I'd like to get to know you. You're a cool kid. You need to open up." she said, still smiling. I felt a smile creep up on my lips. Keiko opened her mouth to say something else, but somebody tapped her on the back. She turned around and I almost spat. It was Takuya.

"May I have this dance?" he asked in a corny accent. Keiko turned around and looked at me for my okay, I nodded. She grinned at me and then walked away with Takuya. I was so mad.

"Hey Kouji." a voice said, I turned around and saw Izumi, who was still dancing with Junpei.

"Hi." I growled, trying to contain my anger.

"You need somebody to dance with?" she asked.

"Nope. I was just leaving." I spat, walking to the concession stands. I waited for the song to end, then I made a beeline straight for Keiko and Takuya. I saw them and I went behind Takuya and grabbed his arm, "Can I talk to you?" I asked in a strained voice.

He smiled at Keiko, "Be right back Keiko." he said softly, then followed me out to the back. "Kouji, what's your problem?" he growled.

"I should be asking you that." I snapped back.

"Kouji, it's a _love_ festival, at love festivals people tend to dance with each other." he said obnoxiously.

"That was no excuse for you to just grab her in the middle of a song." I growled.

"Like I said, it's a love festival, she loves me and she hates you." he said, smiling at his so called cleverness.

"How do you know she doesn't love me?" I snarled.

"How do you know I don't love her?" he asked.

"How do you know I don't love her too?" I spat.

"Because you used to hate her, you were so mean to her before. She used to talk to me about how she was worried that you hated her." he said, his teeth bared in a frown.

"I didn't hate her!" I yelled.

"I'm only dancing with Keiko so that you can't, I'm not going to let her get hurt by a jerk like you!" he shouted.

"I wouldn't hurt Keiko!" I yelled.

He stared at me, trying to control his anger, "It's a love festival, I'll dance with her if I want." he said between gritted teeth. I snarled at him and he began to walk back to the floor. He wouldn't be able to dance with Keiko if I got to her first… I ran past him and back to the floor. "Hey!" he yelled, chasing after me.

I saw her drinking punch and I grabbed her arm, causing punch to spill all over the table. "Kouji!" she shouted, as I dragged her to the middle of the floor. I stopped in a spot where nobody could get to us.

"Dance with me." I said, putting my arm around her waist and pulling her close to me.

"Kouji, where's Takuya?" she asked breathlessly.

"Bathroom." I said as I danced with her.

"Okay…" she said in a suspicious tone. We danced to a half of a song when suddenly Takuya came up behind Keiko and grabbed her arm.

"Let's go Keiko." he snarled.

"She doesn't want to go." I snapped, holding on tightly to her.

"Stop it guys! What's wrong with you two?" she demanded.

"Kouji's just going to hurt you again!" Takuya shouted.

"Takuya's jealous!" I shouted back.

We began to argue and Keiko looked between the two of us in a concerned manner. She pulled away from us and took a step back. We immediately quieted down. "I'm the luckiest girl in the world." she said softly.

"Huh?" Takuya and I choked out in unison.

"Having friends like you two that care enough to try and protect me. I've never had that before." she said. She flung herself at us and hugged us around the necks with one arm each around us. "Thank you guys so much." she whispered. I guess I'm a lucky guy too then.

* * *

This one was super fun to write. Thank you Celestialwriter. Without you, this fic owuld probably be ended by now. Love youuu! Please R&R! Seriously..


	17. Hamburgers

As you may notice, I'm skipping the trailmon race episode. Why?:

1.) I think the episode is the type that needs only the five.

2.) Thanks to Keiko's little head injury, she's unable to do it. (Heh, heh.)

**DISCLAIMER: I don't own Digimon, but I do own Keiko and all the plot changes.**

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Keiko POV:

"So what's the story on this hamburger village?" Takuya asked. I sat next to him on the Trailmon while Tomoki, Kouji and Neemon sat across from us. Izumi and Junpei were jumping all over the place with excitement.

"It's any hamburger lover's paradise." Bokomon said.

"Sounds great!" Izumi squealed.

"Bring on the beef bay-bee!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Yeah, I'm gonna eat my body weight- maybe even all of ours- in burgers!" Junpei exclaimed, grinning. That sounds like a plan. We got off the Trailmon and went through the town, stopping when we saw a Digimon with a hamburger hat on her head. She was crying and had her head on the table, she was surrounded by small brown flying Digimon that were attempting to cheer her up.

"Excuse me, are you alright?" Izumi asked.

"Oh no, dear. A giant Digimon raided our village. He said something about the three moons making him hungry, so my husband gave him a plate of our best burgers." the Digimon exclaimed. I think it's a Hamburgermon, Bokomon explained it earlier.

"Now it's making me hungry." Takuya said.

"Well what happened when he gave him the burgers?" I asked.

"He liked them so much that he stole my husband and carried him to his mansion!" the Hamburgermon cried in anguish.

"Man that's really messed up." Kouji spat.

"Why didn't he just ask for more?" I asked.

"How are we supposed to get our hamburgers now?" Junpei demanded.

"That's thoughtful Junpei." I said sarcastically.

"Please young man, would you guys be able to help me find my husband?" the Hamburgermon asked.

"I suppose. But I wouldn't even know where to begin looking for him." Takuya said.

"The monster will bring daddy back if we make a begger burger." one of the small Digimon said.

"He means better burger, but I'm afraid that's impossible. My husband makes the best burgers around. There's no way anyone could make a better burger than him. And the three moons align tonight! We're doomed!" Hamburgermon said.

"Not with that attitude!" I exclaimed, shoving a fist into the air. Izumi cheered and everyone else looked at me like I was crazy.

"Come on! I think we've scarfed enough burgers in our time to at least make something good! And when the Chameleomon take it to their mansion we'll follow them." Izumi encouraged.

"Nice plan." Junpei praised.

"Zumi's a genius." I said, grinning.

"Yeah, except for that I've never cooked before." Kouji said, sighing.

"I haven't either, but I'll give it a shot." Takuya said.

"I think this'll be a good experience for us." Izumi said smiling. I nodded in agreement.

"I don't even know what's in them, I guess I'll just have to make it up." Takuya said.

"Yeah, we'll all make different ones and have judges taste them." Tomoki said.

"Takuya, this will be a friendly competition, right?" Izumi demanded.

"Of course it will be Izumi, you worry too much." Takuya sighed.

"Yeah, no problem." Kouji said, smiling for once.

"Why don't I be the taster? I would be honored to lend my superior palette to help you guys out, so bring on the beef baby!" Bokomon said.

"That just means you want hamburgers." Neemon said, causing us all to giggle.

"The kitchen's fully stocked, so take anything you need." Hamburgermon said, as we all walked into the large kitchen.

* * *

We all got to our stations and began to build our masterpieces. I decided on a chicken sandwich, I asked Kouji if I should poison it and he just gave me a weird look. So I took it as a negative. I was flipping the chicken around on the pan when I moved to work on mincing the onions.

"KEIKO!" Tomoki suddenly screeched. I turned around and everybody started screaming. I looked at the apron I was wearing and saw that it was on **fire**. I screamed and flopped onto the floor rolling around like an idiot and screaming, "Is it out?!? Is it out!?!"

After they told me I was fine I stood up and started cooking again. Don't get me wrong, I'm a good cook, a very good cook actually, but I'm not the most coordinated chick around. Whenever I cook dinner for my brothers I have to make it at least twice.

I walked past Kouji with a big bowl of sauce I was using to put on the hamburger, when I tripped and fell flat on my stomach, causing the sauce to fly in front of me all over the floor. I looked up with a scowl to see Kouji trying to hide laughter.

"Go ahead." I sighed. He began to laugh out loud and I just laid there, watching him geek out.

After that incident I was cooking the chicken **again** and Takuya came up behind me and scared the crap out of me, causing the chicken to fall off the pan. He started laughing really hard and I turned around and glared at him.

"Takuya, you're such a jerk." I snarled. He grinned and skipped off. I turned back around and started to work on a new piece of chicken.

"That sucks." Kouji said, who was working across from me.

"Huh?" I muttered. I was shocked. I mean, Kouji and I have become… Well, I don't really know what to call it, but it's a lot better than before.

"What Takuya did. Stinks that you have to do it again." he said, staring at me.

"Yeah, I know. At least I was only a couple minutes into cooking my chicken, so that it wouldn't take long to redo it."

Kouji nodded. I looked over at what he was making. I saw squid, scallops, lobster, chocolate and peppers.

"Er… Kouji, what are you making?" I squeaked.

"Deep sea burger." he said, smiling.

"Oh… That's… Nice." I said, smiling nervously.

"You can be first to taste the sauce." he said, his smile becoming even larger. Before I could object, he grabbed the wooden spoon from the large pot on the stove that was simmering.

"Open wide." he said. I hesitantly opened my mouth and he gently put the spoon in and tipped it up a bit so it would slide into my mouth. Actually I'm surprised it didn't grow tentacles and drag itself in. It was rancid.

"How is it?" he asked, he seemed really happy to see that I ate it.

"Mhm." I said, grinning without opening my mouth.

"Great, I'm almost done then." he said, grabbing the pot and walking away with it. As soon as he walked away I spit the sauce into the sink. I couldn't down it. It was ferociously nasty.

* * *

I finished my chicken burgers and made my way to the 'Judging area'. Bokomon and Neemon liked Izumi and Junpei's burgers a lot and moved on to me.

"What's in yours dear?" Bokomon asked. "Mine's chicken, onions, lettuce, tomato and the Takishita secret sauce!" I exclaimed in triumph.

They both had one and liked it a lot. See, if you don't succeed try, try again. They were praising me when I leaned forwards, my hand resting on the side of the large pan for the hamburgers. Being the stupid ass I am I put my weight on it and the hamburgers flew everywhere, and I landed on the floor. Smooth. Bokomon and Neemon asked if I was alright.

"Yeah, the only thing that hurts is my pride." I said with an annoyed laugh. They made sure I was fine again then walked away.

I saw them taste both Takuya's and Kouji and fall to the floor in pain. Bad pain. Then Kouji and Takuya were yelling at each other. Izumi, Junpei and Tomoki all left to go outside and taste test Tomoki's hamburgers when I heard my name being yelled, or screamed for that matter.

"KEIKO!!!" Kouji and Takuya both called.

"Yeah?" I asked feebly.

"Wanna be the tie breaking judge?" Takuya asked.

"No thank you." I said, smiling and beginning to walk away again. Suddenly I felt my legs get pulled out from under me and I flopped onto my stomach. I was getting dragged backwards by Kouji and Takuya, each of them pulling one of my ankles. "No! No no no!" I wailed as they pulled me towards the kitchen. To hell.

Bokomon, Neemon and myself all stayed away from the death glares that Takuya and Kouji were giving each other. I decided to try and remake my burgers for when the Chamelomon came back. I heard a soft sigh and footsteps come over.

"Hey." I turned around to see Kouji standing there, leaning against the counter.

"Hi." I said, flipping a piece of chicken.

"I just wanted to ask you a question." he said.

"Yeah? What is it?" I asked, turning my full attention to Kouji.

"Did you really think I wanted you to die?" he asked in a low voice.

"What?" I choked out.

"You heard me." he said.

"Kouji, I'm not mad at you at all, I would never be." I babbled.

"I was just making sure you didn't think that I hated you. Because I promise you that I never did." he said.

"Of course Kouji." I said softly.

He nodded and walked back over to the blender where he was blending some sort of green thing that I hadn't planned on eating. After a few more hours of glares, growls, snarls, nasty burgers, laying on the ground and moaning for mercy they both made new burgers.

"Presenting the blister burger! The super spicy burger made with hot curry, kimchi and churiso! When you eat it your whole body burns!" Takuya exclaimed, holding him burger up to the sky.

"And the rainbow burger! Apples, oranges, melons, bananas, strawberries and garlic sauce! Healthy, colorful and guaranteed to flush out the pipes!" Kouji exclaimed, holding his burger up.

"No…" I muttered. They both turned towards the three of us to feed us more torture.

* * *

Hours passed, we ate about eight more burgers. Some made of chocolate, cheese, broccoli, lamb… I could barely stand up.

"My burger's the best!" Takuya shouted.

"Wrong again dorkus!" Kouji yelled back. They gave each other death glares.

"Keiko, Neemon, let's leave." Bokomon whispered. We all began to stalk away from the guys.

"Which one is it guys?!?" they both screamed. We all out ran away from hell's kitchen, not even glancing back to check if they were chasing us.

* * *

If you know what's best for you, read and review.


	18. Duskmon appears

I've been having tons and tons of fun writing this. There's no way that I'll stop writing until this is over!

**Disclaimer: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon. At all. But she most certainly owns Keiko and all the plot changes.**

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Izumi POV:

The weather today was beautiful. Even on the Trailmon the warm air was blowing our hair around. We were going across a narrow strip of land on the Trailmon, chugging towards the Rose Morning Star.

"Oh wow! Check it out, the Rose Morning Star's gotta be close now!" Takuya exclaimed, sticking his head out the window.

We all looked out the window towards where Takuya was pointing. I was sharing a square with Junpei. A seat ahead was Takuya, Bokomon, Neemon and Tomoki. Next to them sat Kouji and Keiko, who were looking out through the other side.

"Fantastico! But it's midday, should the clouds be that dark?" I asked, noticing the black, blue and purple tint to the clouds ahead of us.

Bokomon looked in his book to see why it was so dark and he suddenly screamed. The Trailmon stopped, causing us all to lurch out of our seats. "Alright, who was the nimrod who slammed on the breaks?" Junpei demanded.

"That'd be me blue boy, end of the line!" the Trailmon said.

"That can't be right, we're in the middle of nowhere." I cried.

"It looks like the tracks don't stop for miles." Kouji said.

"Why can't we just ride the rest of the way?" Keiko asked.

"Look, if I say it's the end of the line, it's the end of the line. Go on, get out, get lost." the Trailmon said almost like he said this routinely.

"Kouji, can't you have a race with this guy?" Junpei asked.

"You can't do this, we have digirail passes!" I shouted.

"Yeah, yeah. Write it down, you'll sell millions." the Trailmon said sarcastically. What a jerk! "Look, if you want to go, go, I'm not stopping you." he said. The side of the train opened and tilted to the side, causing us all to fall out. The stupid Trailmon then flew into reverse, going away from us with great speed.

"I'll have to admit, I've been dumped before, but not quite like that." Junpei said.

Takuya stood up, "So, everyone in one piece?" he asked.

"Yeah." Tomoki said. "

We're alright." Kouji said from a few feet away, accounting for himself and Keiko.

"Aren't there any normal Trailmon?" I pondered aloud. We all looked over to Bokomon, who was staring straight ahead with odd seriousness.

"Bokomon? Is everything alright?" Keiko asked.

"Welcome to the dark gate." Bokomon said. We all let out different sounds of wonderment. "That temple-like structure behind you is the dark gate. Through it lies the continent of darkness." Bokomon said.

"Why do I get a feeling that's not a good thing?" Junpei asked with a gulp.

"Is it as bad as it sounds?" I asked.

"I wish I could tell you, but I honestly have no idea myself. It is an eerie land shrouded with darkness. But the danger it holds is as legendary as its mystery." Bokomon sighed.

"Isn't there anything in the book about the dark gate?" Keiko asked. Bokomon pulled out his book and revealed it to be completely black.

"Why's it all black?" Tomoki asked.

"It appears that there's no first hand information on it. It seems that many brave Digimon have ventured in, but never returned." Bokomon said, sighing again. I let out a gasp.

"Spooky." Keiko said quietly.

"Only the fool hardy would dare enter the continent of darkness. We'll have to find another route to the Rose Morning Star." Bokomon said.

"But the shortest route is ahead. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?" Takuya said.

"I think we should take a vote." Junpei said, laughing nervously.

"You know, when all of us work as a team, we overcome some pretty tough stuff. So what's the point in backing down now?" Takuya asked.

"Yeah, and we're the legendary warriors, we can do this." Keiko added.

"Yeah! There's nothing we can't handle." Tomoki exclaimed.

"Yeah, we even stopped Grumblemon, and that guy wasn't a pushover." Izumi said.

"You guys know I'm in." Kouji said.

"Well, we took a vote, motion carried!" Takuya said. We all followed Takuya to the gate.

We walked for a while until we were in a dense fog inside a forest. "Do you think Digimon could end up being ghosts?" Tomoki asked.

"What kind of talk is that? Next you'll start telling ghost stories." I sighed.

"It was a dark and stormy night. Luckily there was a terrific guy waiting to come to your rescue." Junpei said. Typical.

The wind moaned, causing Tomoki, Bokomon, Neemon and myself to completely lose it and run into different people. I grabbed whatever was closest to me, which just so happened to be Kouji. "Sorry!" I exclaimed, tearing myself from him. How embarrassing!

"No problem." Kouji said, a blush arising on his cheeks. Jeez.

"Let's get out of here!" Bokomon exclaimed.

"We're not going back, we've been walking around for hours." Takuya said with an exasperated sigh.

"Let's walk back for a few hours then!" Bokomon said.

"H-hey guys?" Tomoki shakily said, "What's that?"

We all looked behind us to see large green orbs floating in mid-air. "Fireflies?" Junpei pondered.

"Maybe there's a town up ahead." Kouji added.

"Come on, let's check it out." Takuya said, leading us over to the lights. We made our way to it and saw it was moss.

"Wow, that moss is actually glowing." Kouji said.

"Is there something wrong with it? Would it be bad to touch?" Keiko asked, tilting her head to the side.

"Let's see." Junpei said, picking up a piece, "Nope, nothing's wrong, we can use these to light up the way." he said. We all picked up some pieces and made our way deeper into the forest.

We ended up coming across a cave, it was suspiciously perfect. "This is weird, it looks as if it's been dug out before." I said, staring into the cave, trying to see what was inside.

"Hey! Anybody in there?" Takuya called in.

"I guess not." I said after a moment of silence.

Suddenly Bokomon let out a yelp and he explained that he felt like this place was full of evil spirits. Something suddenly flew by, causing us all to look over.

"Who's there?" Takuya yelled. His phrase was repeated by some sort of weird voice.

"What are you, some kind of parrot?" Junpei yelled. It was repeated again.

"Knock it off!" Tomoki shouted. Repeat.

"Hey, I know! Beetles battle better in butter!" I shouted. The voices repeated it.

"They're repeating what we say, so let's confuse them with tongue twisters." I said.

"Top chopstick shops stock top chopsticks!" Keiko exclaimed. They repeated it again.

"Six sick bricks might bring back a snack!" Takuya yelled. Repeated once again.

"Peter piper poked and picked a pack of pickled peppers!" Tomoki shouted. Repeated.

"Toy boat, Toy boat, Toy boat, Toy boat, Toy boat, Toy b-aaaagh!" Junpei exclaimed, messing up at the end. The voices repeated it again, even the part where he messed up.

"It's no use, we just can't trip them up!" Tomoki exclaimed, sighing.

"Oh yeah?" Kouji challenged. He threw his glowing rock at the trees, causing it to light up.

"Way to keep it simple Kouji." Keiko said, smirking.

"My goodness, those creatures are Pipismon. They wouldn't hurt a fly." Bokomon stated. Blue bat like Digimon came from the trees in fear.

"They're so cute!" Keiko and I squealed in unison. Out of nowhere a huge tree came crashing down, causing dust to fly everywhere.

"Seems like your journeys are about to be cut short small fries." the familiar voice of Arbormon said. He jumped up and hit the Pipismon with his retractable arms and legs, causing fractal code to appear in a circle around them.

"No! Stop it!" Keiko yelled. He took the fractal code from them and landed on the ground easily.

"That was an appetizer, you kids are the main course!" Arbormon said, he slide evolved to Petaldramon and slammed on the ground. He rampaged through the forest, knocking trees down wherever he went.

"Let's do it!" Takuya yelled. We all beast spirit evolved in unison and prepared to fight Petaldramon.

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Keiko POV:

Petaldramon flung it's tongue towards us, causing us all to jump out of the way, he instead latched onto a tree and ate that. I was nearest Kouji and Tomoki when we saw Petaldramon grow.

"Hey! That made him grow!" I exclaimed.

"Bolo thunder!" MetalKabutarimon yelled, sending two circles of lightning into Petaldramon. The spot where it hit grew back immediately. He grew angry and began to chase MetalKabutarimon into more trees.

"Pyro barrage!" BurningGreymon yelled, sending discs of fire into Petaldramon, only for it to grow back.

"Plasma pods!" Zephyrmon shouted, flying into Petaldramon and scratching him back, the area where he was hit growing back once again. He wrapped his tongue around Zephyrmon, squeezing tightly and causing her to yelp in pain.

"Howling star!" KendoGarurumon yelled, cutting his tongue right off. His double tails smacked into Zephyrmon and KendoGarurumon, knocking them to the ground.

"Frozen arrowheads!" Korikkakumon shouted, wrapping his arrow headed fur around Petaldramon's head.

"Hold him Tomoki!" I yelled. I got onto his other side, "Cherish beam smash!" I yelled, sending the gold beam onto the side of his face. Petaldramon roared out and then flung Korikkakumon into me. We flew about 10 feet and into a tree. I'll tell you what. Giant abominable monsters: They aren't as light as a feather and Tomoki certainly wasn't an exception.

"Thorn jab baby!" Petaldramon yelled, his tail dug into the ground and thorns went all around us, making us all be suspended in the air.

"Leaf cyclone!" he yelled, sending a whirl of leaves straight for us.

"Hold on guys!" BurningGreymon yelled, getting in the way of the attack. He was the only one not captured by the vines. "Wildfire Tsunami!" he yelled, spinning a fire whirlwind towards the attack. It hit the attack, but wasn't strong enough. It knocked us all over the ground. Once we all landed painfully to the ground, Petaldramon stepped forward.

"Giving beast spirits to you puny humans is like giving piles to pigs! So why don't you just do yourselves a favor and hand them over?" his voice boomed.

We all got up, "No! If you want them, you'll have to take them!" BurningGreymon yelled, the leaves surrounding his head began to spin.

"Lupine laser!" KendoGarurumon yelled, shooting a silver beam into Petaldramon's face. Korikkakumon grabbed a hold of his leg and MetalKabutarimon hit him with an electric shock in his back.

Petaldramon was about to hit Korikkakumon with his tail and I jumped into the air. "Passion punch!" I yelled, smashing his tail with my fist, causing it to retreat back. Korikakkumon knocked him onto his back and Zephyrmon and BurningGreymon used their combined power to hit him. His fractal code appeared around him and we all cheered triumphantly.

KendoGarurumon devolved to Lobomon to take his beast spirit, leaving a defenseless Arbormon on the ground.

"Arbormon, now will you give up attacking us?" Takuya questioned him. Arbormon didn't get the chance to answer, because another voice did it for him.

"Yes, he will." it said. A dark figure stepped forth, it had long blonde hair and armor that was red, black and was decked out in skulls.

"Duskmon!" Arbormon exclaimed in relief.

"And just who is he?" I asked quietly.

"Now here comes a cavalry! A friend in need is a friend indeed, right?" Arbormon said in his accent.

"Wrong." Duskmon said, a sword coming from his hand, "With your beast spirit gone, there's really no use for you, is there?"

He hit him with the blood red sword, causing him to lose his fractal code, his spirit and his life.

This disgusted me. "What the hell's wrong with you?!? He's _supposed _to be your friend! How can you _do_ that?!?" I yelled.

He was silent. Completely and utterly silent. But there was one thing that needed no words that we all knew. It was time to fight.


	19. Pain

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon, like, at all. But I certainly own the hell out of Keiko. Don't forget it.

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Keiko POV:

Duskmon raised his head to look at us, staring once again. "Who is this guy?" BurningGreymon asked.

"Duskmon, legendary warrior of darkness." he said in his deep tenor voice.

"Well, that explains the outfit." BurningGreymon said sarcastically.

Duskmon slowly raised his sword, "You have done well against my brethren. Let's see how string you really are." he said. With a swoosh of his sword a red line came from it, heading straight towards us. We all jumped away and the beam hit the trees behind us with an explosion. I ended up landing near Korikkakumon.

"All he did was swing his sword." he said.

"He's so strong." I gasped.

"I've got a bad feeling about this guy." Zephyrmon said.

"Come on, there's only one of him!" BurningGreymon stated. Duskmon laughed. It was kind of creepy.

"Bolo thunder!" MetalKabutarimon shouted, sending two orbs of lightning to Duskmon, sending up dust. BurningGreymon went straight into it. I couldn't see much, but I did see him get thrown out of there. He hit the ground and groaned with pain.

"You're weaker than I thought. I should at least give you the chance to surrender." Duskmon said in his deep tenor voice.

"Junpei, Tomoki, Keiko. Switch to your human spirits!" Kouji ordered.

"Slide evolution!" we all shouted, turning into our human spirits.

"Let's go!" Kouji shouted. We all charged into Duskmon as one. I flew around to the other side of Duskmon, attacking the rear. Lobomon was pushing against Duskmon with his sword. "Love shot!" I shouted, a gold arrow heading into Duskmon along with Tomoki's, Junpei's and Izumi's attacks. It had to work, it just had to.

As soon as we hit him, he was gone. "Where is he?" I snapped.

We all looked up to see Duskmon floating in the sky, "Deadly gaze." he said simply. All of the eyeballs on his suit looked at us and a red beam came from them. It hit the ground and made chunks of rock fly everywhere, we had just managed to get out of the way.

"Your efforts against me are pitiful, certainly you've got more than that." Duskmon said, sighing. Suddenly a fire twister surrounded Duskmon.

"Yeah!" BurningGreymon shouted triumphantly.

"Come on." Lobomon said to Tomoki and myself. The others were also retreating. "Takuya let's go!" Lobomon yelled.

Reluctantly Takuya complied, following us out of the area where he claimed he beat Duskmon. We finally got away from there and devolved back into our human selves. "Man, the dark continent sure is dark." Junpei said with a sigh. Kouji and I were walking in the front. Izumi and Junpei behind us, and Tomoki and Takuya a ways back.

I wasn't really paying attention to what I was doing, I was just listening to Takuya and Kouji argue about Duskmon really being dead. We all stopped for a moment and I just saw Takuya marching up to Kouji, ready to sock him. "Takuya." I warned. He kept walking up, and Kouji was standing his ground. Takuya got to Kouji and was screaming into Kouji's face about leadership and cowardice, then Takuya pushed Kouji.

Okay, I haven't known Kouji very long, but knowing his reactions to certain things, I would assume this is bad. Kouji pushed him roughly back, and things were starting to heat up.

Junpei got behind Takuya and grabbed his arms, holding him back. I got between the two of them and turned to face Kouji, "Please Kouji." I said softly.

He looked at me and then Takuya. "Takuya, you don't care about this team, you just went into the middle of a fight, basically looking to get hurt. And what if you did? Or worse what if Keiko, Tomoki, Izumi or Junpei got hurt?!?" he snarled.

"They wouldn't have!" Takuya shouted. Kouji was about to say something, but Bokomon interjected, stopping the argument to talk about food. Only Bokomon.

We all managed to find some ruins to stay in, and we split into groups to get supplies. Bokomon, Neemon, myself and Kouji all went for water. Junpei and Izumi made a fire and Takuya and Tomoki got food. Neemon and Bokomon were balancing between rocks over the four foot deep stream. They were dipping a bucket into it, collecting water. I was on the other side, dipping my bucket into the water. Kouji's been silent the entire time.

"Awfully quiet over there Kouji." I said, looking up at him. He was across the room, leaning against the wall.

"Hmph." I was silent again.

"It's really stupid to be mad over, yes, Takuya was reckless, but there's no need to hold-"

"Yes there is." he interjected. I looked over at him again. "Keiko, what if you or the others got hurt? What would we do? There's no help out here, nobody to take care of us, we don't have mommy and daddy to take care of it all for us."

I winced. "Sorry." he said softly.

"No, go on." I pushed him, I'm over it.

"Well, it's just that… If you or the others got hurt, I don't know what I'd do with myself, I would never, ever want something to happen to anyone here. I would rather risk my own life." he said. Would he? Would he really kill himself for one of us?

"I can understand that Kouji, sorry if I made it insignificant." I said, smiling.

"Don't be. Hey, Bokomon, Neemon, you done over there?" he asked. I turned around and saw them stepping off the rocks.

"Indeed!" Bokomon said happily. We all walked back to the ruins.

"Are you and Takuya going to be alright?" I asked.

He nodded, "We'll be fine." he said, his voice not as gruff as earlier.

"I hate it when you guys fight." I sighed.

"Sorry." he mumbled.

"What did you just say?"

"What?"

"What you just said."

"Sorry?"

"Yeah!"

"What about it?"

"You never say that!"

"Okay…"

"I'll take a picture of this moment in my head and remember it forever."

"Yeah, and I'll shove it down your throat."

"That was harsh."

"Sorry."

"HAH!!!"

We finally got to the ruins and Kouji went straight to the fire. I went over to Izumi and Junpei and talked to them about earlier. Then all of a sudden Takuya parades in and talks about a great plan that will definitely work. We all attack at once. We already tried that. But no, Takuya insists it will work. Kouji thinks differently. They began to argue and it resulted in Takuya and Kouji leaving to go talk elsewhere.

It wasn't five minutes later that we heard something outside and we all beast spirit evolved, save for me, because I 'just had to' use my arrows. And the worst part about it, was that the four of us were standing here, waiting for Takuya and Kouji to get here.

"Where are they?" I asked nervously as Duskmon came nearer.

"Here!" we looked up to see Agunimon and KendoGarurumon land in front of us.

"You guys alright?" I asked. They nodded and Agunimon looked back at me for a moment. He gave me a we-fought look.

"Keiko, power up your arrow." he said, he then lunged forward.

"Wait!" KendoGarurumon yelled. I shook my head and made the motion with my hands, pulling back the arrow which just appeared in them. This would be difficult. Holding this for just five seconds was hard, but who knows how long Takuya had to take to do this.

Several times Agunimon tried to hit Duskmon. The arrow is getting pulled away from me, but I keep holding on. Agunimon and Duskmon speak for a minute. It's too hard… "Attack now!" Agunimon yelled, going behind Duskmon and holding his arms.

"Go!" I yelled. The other four all ran to all sides of Duskmon, delivering their own attacks. Finally I let go of the arrow. It speeds off towards Duskmon, little sparks of gold flying off of it. It hit at the same time as all the other attacks, causing a large bubble of rainbow to blow up around Duskmon.

I bent over, putting my hands on my knees. I'm surprised I'm not devolved now. I can barely breathe. I felt so weak. The tie die explosion suddenly receded and Duskmon absorbed it, just like that.

He sped over to Takuya, "You will be the first." he said darkly. Agunimon shut his eyes tightly, preparing for the hit. Then it happened. It was in a flash that KendoGarurumon was in the way of Agunimon, devolving into Kouji and falling to the ground._ If you or the others got hurt, I don't know what I'd do with myself, I would never, ever want something to happen to anyone here. I would rather risk my own life. _He wasn't kidding.

Agunimon scooped him up in his arms and screamed out his name. "Kouji! Kouji why?!? Kouji!!!"

Please wake up Kouji. Please wake up. Please wake up. Don't die on us.

"Kouji! No Kouji!" Agunimon screamed again.

Kouji, don't do this. Please wake up, don't do this.

"Kouji?" Duskmon muttered.

Please Kouji, please wake up, survive this.

"Kouji?" Duskmon said again, this time louder.

Kouji, please wake up. Please.

"KOUJI!!!" Duskmon screamed.

We were all enveloped in black. And then there was only pain.


	20. Together

Holy cow! In less than 24 hours, this story's been added to three favorites lists. I'm at a loss for words. Thank you all so much! It would be nice to have some reviews though. Still though, thanks a whole lot. And another thing. Keiko is on the character list because in Digimon 01 or 02 there was a girl named Keiko. Embarrassing!!!

**Disclaimer: I own no Digimon at all. I own Keiko.**

**DO MY POLL!!!!!!**

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I'm alive. Surprising. I thought I would die. I didn't remember much except for the fact that people were yelling and that something was holding me.

Walking hurts. Every step I take hurts like hell and I have to limp slightly. Takuya, Keiko and the others weren't around me when I woke up, and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have left me alone. But one thing I didn't understand.

Why didn't Duskmon kill me? He had his chance, and he completely blew it. And he freaked out when he saw me. The guy's a complete lunatic.

I heard a feminine voice squeal something and saw it. There were four people chained against a huge rock, raised off the ground six or seven feet. I saw Tomoki on the left, staring down. Junpei was next to Tomoki and he was staring ahead at some Digimon at least 20 feet away that were fooling around with their D-tectors. Izumi was moaning for them to let them go. And Keiko was the worst off. She was trying desperately to get out of the chains. She was screaming out profanities and clenching her teeth. It was actually disturbing to see her like that. She was completely different.

"Where are they?!?" she screamed. Rananom and Mercurymon came out of a building next to them, and Keiko was silent.

"Well, well, look what we've got here." Ranamon said, stepping in front of the four. "We've got four dirty little rascals. Four dirty rascals who have lost their little friends." she added. Keiko's head snapped up and she pulled against the chains.

"What?!? You're lying!" she screeched.

"I'm not. Your little leader is gone." Ranamon said, stepping towards Keiko.

"Shut up." Keiko snarled.

"Oh and the little boy who decided to play hero is dead as well." Ranamon added, stepping closer.

"Shut. Up." Keiko said with a ferocity I had no idea even existed.

"You're all alone." Ranamon said, stepping in front of Keiko.

Keiko's eye twitched and she pulled her head back, then pushed it forward as she spit on Ranamon's face. Oh shit. Keiko would never do that. She was pissed.

"You little runt!" Ranamon screamed, lunging straight for her. She would've fought with Keiko if Mercurymon hadn't held her back.

"Not now Ranamon." he said.

"That little brat! She knows nothing about being a lady." she yelled.

"Where are they?!? Tell us where they are now!" Keiko screamed, arching her back to get out of the chains.

Ranamon growled. "I oughta kill you now." she snapped.

"Not now Ranamon." Mercurymon said softly.

"Fine. I won't kill her… I'll just make her suffer." she said, grinning devilishly at Keiko. Keiko didn't even flinch. Ranamon snapped her fingers and in a flash Keiko was upside down. She wasn't being hung up by her hands, but her ankles. Thank God she was wearing shorts… She let out a shriek and began to struggle.

This whole thing went on for about an hour, and several things happened. Izumi and Tomoki were getting tickle tortured and Keiko was still upside down, she had tired herself out from all the struggling and screaming. All she could do was just hang there, silently. Her eyes were shut and she looked like she was asleep. She didn't look too well. Soon enough, Izumi and Tomoki were laughing weakly and Keiko mumbled something about not feeling very good. I couldn't just sit there and watch them get hurt. The laughing stopped and it was replaced with sighs of relief.

I looked over and saw that the tickling stopped, but Keiko was still hanging there upside down. "Talk!" Ranamon shouted.

"Never!" Junpei snarled back.

"Well then, I'll have to do something a bit more drastic." she said. "Dark vapor!" A black mist went around Junpei, causing him to begin to freak out.

"Junpei!!!" I shouted, pulling out my D-tector, getting ready to fight.

**Keiko POV:**

I can barely breathe. I think I'm going to die. I'm far past nauseous, I feel like my head is about to explode and it feels as if someone shoved a bowling ball down my throat. This pain was equal to the pain I felt emotionally. What if Ranamon was right? What if Takuya and Kouji were dead? I can't live with myself knowing that. They meant a lot to me, everybody here does. If Kouji and Takuya were dead, I may as well be.

"And so the fifth hath join us." Mercurymon said. Fifth? I opened my eyes and saw Lobomon standing between Mercurymon and Ranamon, in a fighting stance. So he is alive, then where's Takuya? I thought I was going to throw up, now. I was in desperate need to get out of this position. I shut my eyes again, it felt as if they were bulging out of my eye sockets.

Then I heard grunts, fighting remarks and Calmaramon's annoying voice. I wasn't paying much attention to the fight. I heard a building make a loud noise and opened my eyes to see Calmaramon and Mercurymon jump down a hole, Lobomon must have been in there.

Suddenly Lobomon landed on the ground about 10 feet away from us. "Kouji!" we all yelled in unison. He was face down, unconscious.

"Pyro darts!" Agunimon. It was Takuya! "Takuya!" I shouted in spite of my ravaged voice. Something fell down far from us.

"Lobo Kendo!" I felt myself fall from the chains and I landed on my stomach on the ground.

"Keiko?" it was Izumi.

"Yeah?" I muttered, standing slowly. She handed me my D-tector and I grinned. Showtime.

We all evolved to our spirits; as soon as I was Veenomon I felt much, much better. We all lined up into a united front, ready to fight. It was snowing, it was windy and it was thundering. Odd.

We put up a perfect fight. Beetlemon used his thunder fist on the ground, causing Calmaramon to be electrocuted. Calmaramon was all toasted and angry and whatnot. Very angry actually. She began to drag herself over to us, preparing to knock us out. "Love shot!" I shouted. I hit her on one of her tentacles, it made her stuck to the ground. She let out a shriek of anger and pain. Kazemon did her tempest twist and knocked her into some rocks.

Tomoki then used his blizzard blaster and froze Mercurymon to the ground. Lobomon ran up with his sword and pushed against him, knocking him to his feet. They were at a loss obviously.

Takuya surrounded them with fire, causing them to scream in terror. "What do we do?" Calmaramon screamed.

"Regroup and retreat!" Mercurymon answered, losing his cool shell. Calmaramon slid away down a hill and Mercurymon snapped his fingers and disappeared.

We all cheered, and in spite of my pride I did a little happy dance.

We all devolved. And it was nice. We were all together again. In one piece to be more specific. "I'm so sorry guys, this is all my fault." Takuya said sighing.

"What are you talking about? You're the one who rescued us." Izumi said, bending to Takuya's height.

"Takuya, if it weren't for you, we'd all be dead already." I said honestly.

"But…" Takuya said softly.

"Don't worry about it Takuya. We were all worried about you." Tomoki said.

"I guess I really owe you one Kouji." Junpei said, facing Kouji.

"Nah. All of us owe Takuya. You've really changed." he said, looking at Takuya.

"Yeah, I know. I hardly recognize myself. I don't feel like a kid anymore, I finally realize what being a Digimon is all about. We're in for an amazing ride… All of us." Takuya said, smiling his Takuya smile.

And I couldn't help but smile as well.

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For the love of God review. This one was really hard to write. Besides, reviewing makes my fingers move faster.


	21. The hardest part

Hey hey hey. My apologies to celestial writer, I was wrong. I won't be able to fit 'that chapter' in here. But it will be in. I promise. But sorry! **This takes place after Kouji gets out of Sakakkumon, and before Takuya is out.** Anyway this chapter was a bitch to write. I started this months ago and finished it about two weeks ago. It was hard to get the dialogue correct and have that certain amount of my bad excuse for action. Please enjoy it though. Although that'd be hard to do, considering that this is the worst thing I've ever written in my entire life. So enjoy, or at least pretend to.

**Disclaimer: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon. She does own Keiko and this horrific plot though.**

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Kouji POV:

"DUSKMON!!!" I screamed at the top of my lungs. I had to find him. I just had to.

_I can't believe you're wasting your time. _It was his voice.

"Finding out about you isn't a waste of time!" I shouted.

_Not if you don't find anything. _

"I will find you!"

_Don't you care about what you're going to miss? _

"I'm not missing anything!!!" I screeched.

_You're leaving your friends. They could die. There's still two inside of Sakkakumon. _

"They'll be fine!"

_Are you willing to bet on that? _

I suddenly saw two several second visions. First I saw BurningGreymon in a large red light, screaming. He eventually turned into Takuya and was still getting hurt by the light, still screaming in agony. He then fell to the ground, his goggles breaking. He didn't get up.

Then after that I saw Keiko laying on the ground, clutching her stomach tightly and letting out shrieks of pain that sent shivers up my spine. She had her eyes shut tightly and was writhing on the ground, squirming and twitching.

Then they ended, "What's going on with them?!?" I demanded.

_You'll only know if you go back and find out on your own. _

I turned around slowly, looking at Sakkakumon. I saw a flash of Keiko's face in one of the eyes and Takuya's in one of the others. "I'm sorry." I whispered, running after Duskmon.

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Keiko POV:

I sat at the table with the others, playing a board game. Izumi and I were on a team, Kouji and Takuya on another and Junpei and Tomoki on another. I rolled the dice and we got to move seven steps. We were so close to winning. Mom and Dad walked in.

"Hey guys, want cake?" they asked. Oh yeah, I forgot it's my birthday today. I looked at my mother. Oh mama, I have your eyes, I have your nose too. And daddy, I have your hair color, and of course your attitude.

"I love you guys." I said smiling. They just stared at me. "Mommy? Daddy?" I asked. I looked to see my friends staring at me as well. "Zumi?" I said, shaking Izumi's shoulder. "Why are you all looking at me like that?" I asked. I stood up and walked over to dad. "Papa?" I muttered. He stared at me with anger. "Um, dad?" I said quietly.

He pushed me to the floor, causing me to land on my back painfully. Everybody stood from their spots, "Guys?" I asked shakily. This is some sort of sick joke, right? This isn't really happening. They began to close in on me. I scrambled backwards, "Guys!" I shouted. I ran into something, causing me to lurch forward. I turned to see Naoki. "Nao-nii?" I mutter. He has the same angry eyes. "Your fault." he whispered. "What?"

Everything went completely black, they were gone now. And then I saw it. I saw it all happen again, except this time I was watching it from the outside.

The plane having the abnormal turbulence, the woman in red screaming, mommy yelling out daddy's name in terror. And then the epitome of it all. Daddy unbuckling his own seatbelt and jumping on top of me. Saving me instead of himself.

It went dark again, and as usual I'm alone. I should be used to it now, being alone. It hasn't changed, and I don't think it ever will. My journey is a lonely one. It was meant to be that way. I just sit down and curl my legs to my chest. At least it's quiet. I sigh and close my eyes, it's meant to be.

I opened my eyes then. I looked around and saw that I was in a vast forest. Green grass, large trees… Nothing special. I got up and looked around. Now I remember! We were all separated, we all got pulled away from each other. I hope they're safe. I can imagine that Kouji and Takuya are alright, and Izumi and Junpei. But Tomoki, he's alone. Well there's an inspiration to get out of here quicker.

I walked through the forest, still thinking about the dream. I've always had dreams like that, about what happened, this one just shook me up more than they usually do.

I'm not really getting anywhere with all this walking. It's pretty useless, and I'm so tired. I suddenly heard a rustle in the bushes, "Who's there?" I called. Silence.

I must be going crazy or something. On that note I continued walking. The forest was sort of like the forest where I got my spirit. As soon as that thought crossed my mind the sky turned dark and I saw myself run by the huge jewel in my arms.

"What?" I said aloud. What the hell's going on? I saw a Wolfenimon run by as well, chasing me.

This is when I got my spirit. I'm watching myself get my spirit. I ran over to myself in time to see me get knocked over by Lobomon, who came from the top of a tree. I was always wondering where in the world he came from.

I saw myself hide, then throw a rock at the Wolfenimon. Then I fell off the cliff and digivolved into Veenomon.

It went dark again and I found myself in my room. I looked around, but noticed something was strange. I went to my mirror and almost screamed in horror. I was about six years old. I had the brown hair only up to my chin, I was wearing pink pajamas and I had darker eyes, as time progressed they got lighter. I touched my face to make sure it was real and it sure as hell was.

I walked onto the stairs and sat down. I saw my mother walk through the hallway and towards her office. She spotted me, "Keiko! Sweetie, come here!" I didn't want to. Even though this was my complete dream, I couldn't. I wouldn't. I couldn't make things worse, going to her would only make it hurt more. "Keiko? What's the matter?" she asked, taking a step closer.

"I'm a little tired." I muttered, not looking at my mother.

"Are you?" she asked.

I nodded. "Well, I'm doing some work in the office, why don't you nap on the couch while I work?" she asked.

Oh, mom. I have to now. I have to. My mother. I'll never be able to see her again. This may only be an illusion, but I need this.

I stood up and walked down the stairs and took my mom's hand. She walked me to the black leather couch and put a white blanket over me.

"Sleep well sweetheart." she said, kissing me on the forehead. She walked over to her desk and started typing on the laptop. I couldn't close my eyes, I didn't want to lose her from my sight. She was so beautiful. Her bright blue eyes that she gave to me. Her short light brown-blonde hair. And she was gone. She was making me suffer. This dream was going to kill me. Time froze.

"Enjoying the moment?" a voice echoed. I looked at myself, I was eleven again. And the house was gone. I was in the woods again.

"I thought it was absolutely adorable, you and your mother. I'm sure you must miss her." the voice said. I bit my lip. "Yes, she seemed like she loved us." the voice said again. The voice was oddly familiar. It was feminine, soft, but so… horrifying.

"You know, mom was always so sweet, so forgiving, so much like us. We definitely take some of her personality."

"We? Who's we?" I called. Somebody stepped out from the trees.

"You and me." I looked to see myself. It was an older version of me, probably about five years older. I was speechless. "You know, things would be much easier if we never got onto that plane." my clone said.

"And what do you mean by that?" I demanded.

"You know what I mean." the clone said, smiling. "You're the reason mom and dad died." she said.

"No." I spat.

"Uh, yeah, you are." she said.

"No, I'm not!" I shouted. I pulled out my D-tector, "Execute! Spirit evolution!" I yelled, transforming into Veenomon.

"Hmph." the clone said, staring me down. "Do you think killing me is the answer?" she asked.

"Love shot!" I yelled, I shot an arrow at her and she swiped her hand, causing it to fly in another direction.

"Pathetic." she spat.

"Love shot!" I yelled again, shooting another ineffectual arrow.

"Nice shot. But it's my turn." she said. She stared at me for a moment and I flew backwards into a tree painfully. I let out a yelp as I collided with the rough bark.

"You know. You were always weak." she said.

"Affection harp!" I yelled, shooting a beam of gold at the copy of me. She moved out of the way and it breezed past her.

"Try again." she said. I flew into the air, I couldn't fight her, I needed to run. I suddenly felt a horrible pain in my right wing.

"Aaah!" I screeched.

"Oh Keiko! Come back!" she yelled. The wing gave out and I plummeted to the earth, crashing into the ground loudly.

"Did you really think I'd let you get away, just like dad let you?" she asked.

"Love shot!" I screamed, the arrow went right past her head.

"Oh God, give it a rest." she said, sighing.

"Love shot!" I yelled again, this time she caught the arrow in midair, snapping it in half as soon as she grasped it again. "You baka." she said. She pointed a hand to me and managed to slam me into a tree.

"Agh!" I screamed, devolving back to myself.

"You were always weak." she said, "Always looking for a hero." she kneeled down next to me and caressed my cheek. "You never really did much on your own." she tilted her head, "Which is why mother and father are dead." she said.

"That's not true!" I yelled. She had a wry smiled. She stood up and kicked me in the gut, knocking me about ten feet and into another tree.

"Oh, but it is." she yelled. "You have no idea. If you weren't on that plane, Keiko. If you hadn't let dad get on top of you, if you didn't let them die-"

"STOP IT!" I screamed. I felt a wrenching pain in my head.

"Oh Keiko, you know it's true. All you'll ever do in life is get in the way, cause more pain. You are worth nothing." she said.

"No." I squeaked.

"Yes." she said back, "And if you knew the pain they went through." She shook her head, "Oh poor mom, it hurt for her so badly Keiko." she tilted her head at me and smiled, "Want to see for yourself?" she asked.

I felt my eyes become wide. A horrific pain went throughout my whole body, causing me to scream in pain. I landed on my back and clutched the ground with my hands tightly. I felt my chest spasm over and over again. I was kicking my legs in complete pain. "Ah! Aha!" I squeaked.

"Oh Keiko, if you think that's bad, here's what dad felt, and remember that you should have felt this, but he took it away from you."

I felt a crushing pain in my stomach. I pulled my arms around it and screamed in agony. Never in my life would I have ever imagined a pain like that. I was on my side, crying out in pain. It began to subside slowly. I managed to get onto my hands and knees shakily, facing away from her.

"They hate you Keiko." she said.

"No." I muttered. I could hear my heart beating.

"They'd rather you be dead." she said.

"You're lying." I hissed. My heart was speeding up.

"They regret it all Keiko." she said.

"Shut up." I whispered. My heart was so loud and fast.

"He regrets letting you live." she said.

"SHUT UP!!!" I screamed. I felt myself being engulfed in gold light. "Execute! Spirit evolution!" I screamed.

Somehow. Somehow I digivolved without my D-tector. I was Veenomon. "Love shot!" I yelled, holding the arrow for a moment and letting go, the arrow glowing a brilliant gold and silver. It hit my clone in the forehead, causing her to fall to her knees. The clone shifted to another shape, it was Callomon. And now he was the one with the arrow in his robe on his knees.

A fractal code went around his hips. "Goodbye." I whispered, "Fractal code digitize!" I yelled, taking the fractal code from Callomon. I saw the time symbol on my D-tector and devolved back into myself.

I just stood there and stared at my feet. A giant eye appeared and through it I saw the outside. I stepped into in and got lowered to the ground slowly.

I saw Izumi, Tomoki and Junpei all standing there cheering for me. They looked so happy to see me, and it hurt. As I was carried down that beam of light, I realized that there was only one thing I wanted, and that was comfort. I finally reached the bottom and looked at Izumi for a moment.

"Keiko?" she whispered. I threw myself at her, my arms around her neck and my face buried in her shoulder, crying. All Izumi did was hold on to me tightly, not letting go of me. And that's all that I needed.


	22. Kouichi

Sorry that this took 10 days 7 hours and 13 minutes to write. Well, the ten days part is right... But anyway it was a hell chapter. Also I was working on the sequel to this... SURPRISE!!! Okay. Well, just read it?

**Disclaimer: I own Digimon. Just kidding. I don't. I don't own Keiko either. I lied. Yes I do.**

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Things flew by after that point. I think that everything that happened in there was clouding my mind. I don't think I realized when we defeated Sakakkumon, or when we helped Angler, the Trailmon. All I knew was two things were in my head at all times.

My past for one, I couldn't stop thinking about my mother, and how I got to see her. I kept thinking about the way the older me looked. Evil, unhappy, is that the way that I'll be?

The other thing was the figure. Just this figure was always in my head. Standing there, just staring at me. And I didn't know what it was. It was a boy. He was probably a little taller than me, and he had these dark eyes. Blue. But so dark. Not like mine, they were much darker. And he just stared at me, it was as if he knew-

"Keiko!" Izumi shouted. I looked at her and she pointed to the distance, where Takuya and Kouji were. There was somebody else there too, a human. A human? Wait, what?

"Who's that?" I asked loudly over the rush of wind from sitting on top of the speeding Trailmon.

"A boy?" Tomoki pondered.

Angler stopped several yards away from them and we all got off and ran over to them.

**Kouichi POV:**

I was just finishing telling my story to Kouji and his friend when four other kids ran over.

"Finally! We found you!" the blonde girl said exasperatedly. I didn't say much, but Takuya started talking to the others mentioning something about a new team member.

I looked the others over, there was a young boy, probably seven or eight. He had brown hair and wore a huge orange hat.

Then there was another brown haired boy, he was larger and probably a year or so older than myself.

There was a blonde girl in a purple hat and other purple wear that was talking to the boy.

Last there was a brown haired girl who was a bit shorter that Kouji, probably the same height as the boy who was with Kouji. She was just looking at me, staring almost. She narrowed her eyes and I felt myself squirm. "Oh, I'm sorry, it's just that… You seem familiar." she said softly, still staring intently.

"Oh." I said quietly.

"I'm Keiko. What's your name?" she asked in a very friendly tone, smiling.

"Kouichi." I said quietly.

"Hi Kouichi." she said, smiling. I nodded and she turned her head and talked to the goggle wearing boy.

"I'm Izumi, nice to meet you." the blonde girl said, grinning widely at me.

"I'm Junpei." the larger boy said.

"And I'm Tomoki." the littlest one said, smiling up at me. I nodded once again. I guess that things are a little awkward, you know, after almost killing everybody, including your own brother, it's easy for awkwardness to set in.

"Well, no use to stand around outside all day. Why don't we get to the Trailmon?" Izumi said, smiling at everybody. She seemed really nice.

"Yeah, I'm game!" Keiko exclaimed. We all walked to the Trailmon together, I let myself lag to the back, and when we all got on I walked to a different car.

"Kouichi, aren't you going to sit with us?" Keiko asked. I shook my head and left to the other car. I didn't want to be a part of this.

**Keiko POV:**

This is fucked up. That's the figure. The figure I kept seeing! That's him! I know it! He's the one, he has to be.

The train ride went by quickly. We were all thinking about the past events. Kouji was thinking about Kouichi, and visa versa. I was thinking about what I had seen, and how it's here right now. Takuya, Izumi, Junpei and Tomoki were quietly chatting. You could basically cut the tension with a knife.

Once the train finally did stop, Kouji got off without a word, not even to his brother, and went to the small station. Kouichi didn't even get off the train. We all stood there, not knowing what to do.

"I feel really bad for Kouji and his brother, isn't there anything we can do to help?" Tomoki asked.

"I say leave them alone." Junpei muttered. Attitude?

"Well that's real helpful Junpei." Izumi scolded.

"I just think that their problem is a private one, and out of respect we should just leave them alone." he said in an arrogant tone.

"Well out of respect I need to do something." Takuya said, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Whoever's closest to him should talk to him." I said.

"That would be Takuya." Izumi said.

He stared at us incredulously, "What?"

"She's right." Tomoki said.

"Kouji needs you, you have to do something." I said. He nodded and sighed, walking into the station.

We heard talking for a few moments. "Oh great, he's mad." Junpei said.

"Stop it!" Izumi snapped. Izumi's a riot.

"We should go in and help." Tomoki said. He always manages to be the most wise. Little smartass. We opened the door quietly and peered in, Takuya was talking.

"I have a little brother and most of the time we can't stand each other. Well, let's see. In my case, my little brother always wants to hang out with me and my friends, but I don't let him, 'cause he's just a bratty little pest, and when I do play with him, I usually end up making him cry, but I can't really help it, the twerp just bugs me. I guess I should really work on that." Silence. Kouji blinked twice, trying to absorb what he was just told. "Oh! But he still likes me. Does that help?" Takuya asked.

"I guess." Kouji said with a sigh.

"You guys, I have a brother too." Tomoki chirped. Wisdom. "He's in college, so we don't see each other very much. And sometimes he's kind of mean. But I guess that he's just that way for my own good… Not that it feels good. But… You know what I mean…" I guess I should say something.

"I have brothers, too. Three of them. And they're all older than me. And sometimes they're over controlling and protective. I know that they do it because care, but I want my own life. We get along most of the time, but they're really immature at times. They smell and they can't cook or clean. So they're just big lugs. I mean they do a lot to make money, I guess, but respect should be a mutual thing… And well… Never mind…" Burned.

"Hey, at least you guys have siblings, I wish I did." Junpei sighed.

"I don't know that I'd want the responsibilities of taking care of a little brother or sister, unless they were like me of course." Izumi said. She would say that.

"Well, I'd love to have a little brother or sister." Patamon said.

"Better get busy!" Neemon said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Bokomon demanded. Silence.

"We don't mean to be a downer Kouji." I said softly. Silence.

"Hey, thanks a lot you guys." Kouji said, smiling softly.

"No problem. Look, there's no right or wrong way to be a brother. Just do what comes naturally." Takuya said. We all looked over to the Trailmon where Kouichi was still sitting. Kouji let out a soft sigh and looked down.

"Don't worry Kouji, it just takes some time." I said. After a few minutes we all got back onto the Trailmon and rode towards the Rose Morning Star.

**Kouichi POV:**

I sat there on the Trailmon, alone. I didn't understand why they didn't hate me. Why they act like everything's okay, when we all know that it's not.

"Did you know that light and dark are brothers?" a small voice chirped. I looked up to see Patamon floating in front of me. "It's true Kouichi, one can't live without the other. Darkness isn't a bad thing unless you choose to make it that way."

I smiled, "You're right. And I guess you would know, having been a great celestial digimon… Unless you're just trying to make me feel better. Do you really mean that?" I asked.

"Really, silly." he said, giggling.

"Thanks Patamon." I said. Suddenly he turned his head to the side, his face contorted in anger.

"Is there something wrong?" I asked.

"Yeah, and that something's coming and it's really scary." he said.

Suddenly the Trailmon flew onto it's side, causing the windows to break. I fell onto the side and rolled out the window with Patamon. As the Trailmon tipped over, about to crush us, I grabbed Patamon and scurried out of the way.

"You okay?" I asked. He nodded, burying his face into my shirt. I looked up and saw Cherubimon towering over us, looking pissed off.

"Cherubimon!" Kouji yelled, he was still in the Trailmon, staring out of the window. Cherubimon simply stared at us, then kicked the front of the Trailmon through the air, causing it to scream while it flew away.

"Payback time." Takuya said, probably doing a cheesy grin. I couldn't see him.

"Execute!" three or four voices yelled in unison. One said 'spirit evolution' while the others said 'beast spirit evolution' Four digimon flew into the air, landing in front of myself and Patamon. I remembered their names from previous encounters. I think it was Zephyrmon, Korikkakumon, Beetlemon and Chikarimon. Takuya and Kouji then evolved into Beowolfmon and Aldhamon.

"Avalanche axes!"

"Lightning blitz!"

"Hurricane gale!"

"Cherish beam smash!"

"Cleansing light!"

"Atomic inferno!" They all let out their most powerful attacks, and it didn't even leave a scratch.

"This isn't working." Beowolfmon growled in frustration.

"Well, he is the big boss, we'll have to tag team him. Korikkakumon, I think it' time to break out our combo attack!" Beetlemon shouted. In a flurry of snow, Korikkakumon threw his axes into the air and Beetlemon flew up and grabbed them. "Here goes nothing!" Beetlemon yelled.

"Proton slam! Avalanche axes!" they yelled in unison. He flung the axes at Cherubimon, landing on his chest, not doing a thing.

"My turn." Cherubimon said, grinning. He thrust his chest forwards, causing the axes to fly towards Beetlemon quickly. It would kill him.

Aldhamon flew up and deflected them easily. "We'll need more than that to beat this guy." he said.

Chikarimon looked up, "Then let me and Izumi try something!" she yelled. Aldhamon nodded reluctantly.

"Zumi!" she yelled. Zephyrmon nodded she sent a twister, into the air at an angle, facing Cherubimon. Chikarimon put her arms out to her sides, gold circles surrounding them. She jumped into the whipping winds and slammed her hands together, making one big circle. She began to spin around at a great speed, matching the winds. "Passion winds!" they yelled in unison.

Chikarimon flew into Cherubimon's chest, forming a sort of power drill with her body. That had to have worked. Chikarimon flew back, getting out of the way of Cherubimon, who was still standing tall.

"Now what?" she cried.

"Solar wind destroyer!" Aldhamon shouted, sending a huge red orb at Cherubimon. Which did nothing once again.

"Enough!" Beowolfmon shouted, pulling out his sword.

"Frozen hunter!" A huge silver wolf lunged at Cherubimon. Ineffectually of course.

Cherubimon grinned, "You had your chance, now my turn! Storm of judgment!" Lightning flew around throughout the sky, hitting both Zephyrmon and Beetlemon. They devolved and Izumi and Junpei fell to the ground.

"Hey!" Korikkakumon yelled, "Avalanche axes!" he sent two axes at Cherubimon, but just like before he shot them back, hitting Korikkakumon dead on. Tomoki fell to the ground sharply.

Cherubimon looked over to me and Patamon on the ground and lightning flew towards us.

"No! Kouichi!" Beowolfmon yelled, he ran over and got on top of me, saving me. And it hurt, knowing that I almost killed him, yet he saved me. He became Kouji and fell to the ground. Cherubimon just smiled and was about to hit us with another one.

"NO!" I screamed, grabbing my brother into my arms, protecting him as he did me. Nothing happened. I waited and waited, but there was no pain. Nothing. I looked up and saw Chikarimon behind Cherubimon's head, pulling his head back.

Cherubimon reached back, grabbed her arms and flung her to the ground. Chikarimon changed back into Keiko and then Aldhamon flew towards Cherubimon, looking angry that he hurt us all.

"Storm of judgment!" he yelled, hitting Aldhamon with lightning and causing him to devolve into Takuya. I looked down and saw Kouji was stirring in my arms, "Kouichi?" he muttered. I saw that Izumi and Junpei were moving, and that Tomoki was about to stand up. Keiko was sitting up as well and Takuya was groaning and pulling himself up.

I stood up and looked around, seeing to it that Patamon, Bokomon and Neemon were alright as well. "Well, I'm disappointed. I was expecting more of a challenge." Cherubimon said, staring at all the bodies on the ground. He then turned his attention to me, "And you, losing to them. How pathetic."

I felt the anger swell into my chest. "I'm glad!" I spat, running over to Cherubimon. I'm pretty sure that Kouji called after me, but I didn't care. I was so impossibly angry. "I lost when I listened to you, you made me fight my own brother!" I snarled.

"It was your own choice. Isn't that what you wanted?" he asked. Wanted? I didn't want this. I didn't want any of this to happen to me.

"No! You lied to me! You used me!" I yelled.

"You're wrong." he said.

"What?"

"I merely set the stage. The spirit of darkness chooses it's owner. To be selected, one must possess a very dark heart. Otherwise, the spirit's powers are useless. I offered it to many before you, but the spirit rejected them all. The power of darkness is your destiny Kouichi. It's where you belong. Accept it, and be my servant once more."

It chose me? My heart? My dark heart? I was evil inside? How could this be happening? "Don't listen to him, he's lying!" Kouji yelled from behind me.

"No, it's true, my heart was filled with anger and jealousy. And darkness became the only comfort for my pain." I said softly. I heard Kouji making sounds behind me, as if he was in pain. Pain that I was causing. "But that's in the past." I said. I'm no longer evil. I have friends now, I have a brother. I'm not evil. "I don't want revenge anymore, I'm done hiding in the dark." I turned and looked over to Kouji, who was staring at me in shock and fear. "I'd rather die than betray my brother." I added.

"So be it." Cherubimon growled. He put his hands out as if to hit me with an attack, and I just stood there, prepared to meet my destiny.

"Kouichi!" Kouji screamed from behind me. Suddenly a beam of light came from behind, soft winds blowing my hair. Two figurines appeared in front of me. Spirits. I even got a D-tector! At that point I evolved and used the _true _power of darkness on Cherubimon. And apparently it worked because I defeated him. Or should I say his decoy. Once I defeated it I decided it was high time for me to go to the Rose Morning Star and take care of him for real.

"Kouichi! Wait! What are you doing?" Kouji asked, grabbing my shoulder.

"I have to face him alone. You guys should just leave." I said, my voice a bit harsher than I had intended.

"Sorry. Not gonna happen bro." Kouji said back, his grip tightening on me shoulder. Now I was annoyed.

"The only thing that can defeat him is the true power of darkness. You'll only get in my way." I said.

"But I have to help nii-san. True darkness depends on the light." he said.

"Sorry, but I'm going too, somebody has to get in there and save Ophanimon." Takuya said in his determination voice.

"Don't think that you're leaving me behind. We're a team, and we stick together." Keiko said.

"I wanna go too. After all we've been through together, we have to stop the bully who caused all of this, right?" Tomoki added.

"And if he goes I go too, besides I'm the oldest. I gotta make sure he stays out of trouble." Junpei added. "And I have no intention of letting you guys have all of the fun." Izumi said, smiling.

"Then it's settled. We're all going. Together!" Takuya exclaimed, leading the pack towards Cherubimon.

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**TWO SYLLABLES. RE-VIEW. haha.**


	23. Shenanigans on the moon

Updates! Okay, you may notice a gap here. I didn't really want to change anything in these few episodes, because they revolve around Kouji and Takuya. I think it should be kept that way, not changed. You can go wikipedia and whatnot to look up these episodes which I will be skipping. I'm skipping episodes 34-38. Sorry, there's not much I can so with those. (Sad face.) Another thing, I changed one of Veenomon's attacks. What was before Affection _harp_, is now Affection _ring_. You'll see it in this chapter, so yeah. Also, I was stupid in chapter 17. It was the hamburger chapter, and I wrote _Hamburgermon _instead of _Burgermon_. Sorry! Lastly I'm going to tell you the readings in the poll:

Kouji has **7** votes. **50 percent **of the votes.

Takuya, Kouichi and Izumi have a three way tie with **2** votes each, each of them having **14 percent **of the votes.

Junpei has **1** vote, getting him **7 percent**.

Tomoki has **none**. Which wasn't very surprising to be honest.

Anyway, vote it up!

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. At all. So you can't sue me. Ha. But I do own Keiko. So I can sue you! Haha! Unless you ask to use her first, then I wouldn't mind.**

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"_Keiko? Where are you going?" Naoki asked, standing up from his spot on the couch._

"_I'm going to Kotone's." I replied, still a little sour from earlier._

"_No. I told you you're not going to Kotone's party." he snapped._

"_And why not? It's just a sleepover, we're just going to watch movies and-"_

"_No, you're not going at this time of night."_

"_Naoki, I can ride the train, it's only fifteen minutes."_

"_I'm sorry Kei. I would let you go if I could drive you, but you know I can't with the dinner with the partners tonight, and-"_

"_Naoki, I'll be fine."_

"_I'm sorry, you can't go."_

"_Why?""I don't want you out there alone."_

"_Don't you trust me?""I do trust you, it's just the rest of these people I don't trust."_

"_They're not all bad."_

"_How do you know who's good and who's bad, huh?"_

"_There's good in everyone, you can't just expect them to all be horrible people."_

"_You're not going. End of discussion."_

"_You can't tell me what to do!" I finally snapped. I never raised my voice, ever._

"_Yes I can." Naoki sighed, he knew I was upset._

"_No you can't!" I shouted, my voice becoming strained with my frustration._

"_Keiko, you will do as I say, understand?"_

"_You're not my father!" I snarled. Immediately after I said it, I felt horrible. We never brought him or our mother up. It was almost like taboo in our house to speak of them._

"_I know I'm not your father Keiko. But according to the court ruling, I'm your legal guardian, which means I make the rules. That means, no sleepover at Kotone's." he said, his face looking angrier._

"_Why can't you just trust me? Why can't you just take a chance and let me-"_

"_Enough."_

"_I hate you."_

_Naoki stared for a moment and shook his head, "What would mom and dad think of you right now, Keiko?"_

_I stared at him for a moment and then turned around and headed back upstairs. I hated myself. I hated myself for ever arguing with Naoki, for ever saying I hated him, for ever being born._

It was dark. Very dark, actually. I didn't know why I was here, in the dark, but I was. And I knew there was pain, but it's not here anymore. Just slight nausea. But I wanted to know where I was.

I opened my eyes slightly, I was only able to make out figures, blurry outlined figures. They were in front of a bright light. I shut my eyes again, feeling a bit woozy.

"Hey kid! Come over here, she's moving!" a voice shouted.

"What?" another voice questioned, it sounded like Kouichi's. Speedy footsteps echoed throughout the room and then stopped once they were near. I noticed I was laying down on something. It was too hard to be a bed. Maybe it was a table… I don't know.

"Keiko? Keiko, are you awake?" the voice asked. I didn't really feel up to speaking much, so I tried to open my eyes again. I once again saw the figures, one more was there, leaning over the thing I was laying on. It stung a lot to open them, it was bright, so I shut them again. Besides, I was too tired to open my eyes. Takes a lot of energy to be thrusted through the air in an explosion… Wait, what? I sort of remembered, getting hurt, landing on the ground, feeling like I just got trampled by a herd of buffalo.

"Keiko?" the voice asked again.

"Yeah?" I answered softly.

"You okay?" I opened my eyes, feeling like an idiot for having them closed like that while talking to somebody. I saw Kouichi standing there, surrounded by star shaped Digimon.

"Yeah." I said again, answering his question.

I heard a whoosh of machinery and felt the table move a bit. I realized that, before, I was boxed in by these horizontal machine parts over me. They were moved and I was able to get up. One of the star Digimon helped me get to a sitting position. "Glad you're up." Kouichi said, smiling.

I smiled softly. "What happened? Why are we here?" I asked, looking around.

"Well… There was an explosion, and we were launched here."

"Here? What's here?"

"The moon."

My jaw dropped, "No way."

"I didn't believe it either." he said.

"Is anyone else awake?" I asked.

"No. Just you and me." he answered, stretching his back a bit.

"Oh. We must be fast healers or something." I said, looking around to see everybody laying on the tables as well.

"That could be the case for you, but not me. I woke up at the bottom of a hole. You guys were all unconscious and on the ground. I got help. But I was never as badly hurt as you all." he said, looking a little troubled.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"It's just that… No never mind. It's just stupid." he said, smiling.

"If something's bothering you, you should let it out. No use in keeping it bottled up, right?" I asked, trying to comfort him.

"Well… it's just weird… I mean, everybody was hurt. Except me. Why wasn't I hurt like you all? I'm worried that-"

"Kouichi?" a voice muttered.

We looked over to see Kouji standing up, a few feet behind Kouichi.

"Otouto-san." Kouichi said, sounding a bit off guard, "I didn't realize you were awake."

"Just woke up." he said smiling. It was nice, because Kouji seemed happier with Kouichi around. And a happy Kouji is really nice.

"You alright?" Kouichi asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Kouji answered, still smiling.

There was suddenly a loud crash somewhere in the room. We all looked over to see Takuya sprawled laying on his back. He looked over at us and gave a thumbs up. Typical Takuya. Izumi got out of her machine thing and stretched, "Well hello." she said, seeming half asleep.

"Hi Zumi." I said, grinning. Izumi's so nice.

A few minutes later we were all awake, and staring out a huge window, looking at the view of the Digital World.

"So we're on the moon?" Takuya asked, his face pressed against the glass.

"I can't believe it." Izumi said, her voice shaky.

"Well, I couldn't either, but it's true." Kouichi said.

Junpei looked upset, "I guess… It's not made out of cheese, huh?"

There was silence, "No." Kouji answered dryly.

"You really thought it was Junpei?" I asked, a bit shocked that he would believe something so ludicrous.

Bokomon suddenly stomped his foot, or whatever, on the ground, "Alright already! Now's not the time to get flaky! We've got to get to the Digital World and save it from Lucemon!"

"And how exactly are we supposed to do that?" Junpei asked.

Patamon floated over, "Superstarmon said there are no terminals or rails, so we can't take a trailmon."

"So that means we're stuck here?" Tomoki asked.

"No, there has to be a way back." Takuya said all triumphant-like.

Kouji had his arms crossed, "And that is?"

Silence.

"You don't know, do you?" Bokomon asked.

"Well, let's all brainstorm, we've got to come up with something, right?" Takuya asked.

We all got into little thinking poses of our own, when we heard another piece of the Digital World disappear.

"Oh man, we've gotta hurry!" Takuya shouted, "Spirit evolving may not help us think, but it's worth a shot!"

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Kouichi POV:

We all spirit evolved, save for Junpei and Kouji, who beast spirit evolved.

"Alright everyone, fire on my signal! And give it everything you've got!" Takuya yelled, charging up an attack.

"You got it. Shadow meteor!" I yelled, launching a dark orb from my chest.

"Bolo thunder!" MetalKabuterimon yelled, launching twin thunder circles.

"Tempest twist!" Kazemon shouted, spinning on her hands in a flurry of wind.

"Blizzard blaster!" Kumamon yelled, shooting snowballs from his gun.

"Love shot!" Veenomon yelled, shooting a gold arrow.

"Lupine laser!" KendoGarurumon shouted, shooting a silver beam from his mouth.

"And last, but certainly not least!" Agunimon announced, he pus his hands into fists preparing to thrust them forward in an attack, "Pyro punch!" All of our attacks flew into the air.

"That ought to take care of… Whatever we were shooting at." MetalKabutarimon said.

"What exactly _were _we shooting at?" Veenomon asked.

"Well, nothing specific, we were just firing that way." Agunimon answered.

"Now I'm confused _and _annoyed." KendoGarurumon snapped.

"What _were _you trying to do, genius?" MetalKabutarimon asked, his voice sounding a bit annoyed.

"I don't know, I thought if we all fired in one direction, we could move the moon," Agunimon said, scratching the back of his head. "You know, we could use the force of our attacks to nudge it closer to the Digital World."

"Uh… What?" MetalKabutarimon asked.

"Well, at least we gave it our best shot!" Agunimon said enthusiastically, he began to laugh.

"Come on you guys let's go." Kazemon sighed over Agunimon laughing wildly, while saying something about being a genius, and how he didn't care what anybody thought.

"He's a maniac." Veenomon said, following Kazemon.

We all began to follow Kazemon's lead away from Agunimon.

"He's lost it." Kazemon agreed with Veenomon.

Agunimon's laughs ceased, "Where are you going you guys? Wait up!"

There were several attempts to get to the Digital World, and they all failed. Kouji immediately got fed up. "Leave this to me." he growled, he sped up a ramp and up to the Digital World.

"Look. He made it!" Veenomon said, smiling.

Suddenly there was a shocking sound, then we saw KendoGarurumon getting electrocuted.

"Kouji! No!" Agunimon yelled in panic. KendoGarurumon fell to the ground with a crash. We all ran over to him, trying to see if he was alright.

"Kouji, are you okay?" I asked, worried about my brother.

"What the hell happened to you up there?" Agunimon asked.

"I got stuck in something. It drained all my energy. All I could do was crash land to keep from dedigivolving." KendoGarurumon said, disappointment evident in his voice.

"I think I have an idea." Veenomon said.

We all looked over at her, "Kazemon can you help me out?" she asked. Kazemon agreed eagerly.

"Let's go!" she shouted, flying into the air, Kazemon close behind her.

We saw them go up to the stream, but not close enough to get sucked in.

"Affection ring!"

"Hurricane wave!"

We saw the signature tornado hit the stream, followed by Veenomon making the gold ring appear in her hands, flip over and throw it into the stream.

The stream began to shake slightly, looking like it was giving way.

"Great job ladies!" Agunimon shouted in encouragement.

Suddenly the stream sent two waves into Kazemon and Veenomon, shocking them.

"No!" MetalKabuterimon yelled panicked.

They plummeted to the earth with great speed, just like KendoGarurumon did. They landed only a few feet away. Kazemon landed on her stomach and skidded across the ground. Veenomon landed on her back and rolled twice.

"Are you guys okay?" Kumamon asked.

"Yeah." Kazemon said.

"That thing up there won't let anything through." Veenomon said.

We came to the conclusion, thanks to the help of some Gotsumon near by, that we crossed the electromagnetic stream, thanks to the velocity of the Royal Knights' attacks. We also figured out that some Hamburgermon were able to cross the stream.

In a rocket ship.

MetalKabuterimon looked at the equation he drew in the dirt. "Okay, times the square route of pi, divide by 5, carry the two…" he muttered.

"Where'd you get those equations?" I asked skeptically.

"I saw them in a book once." MetalKabuterimon answered defensively.

"Well, that's reassuring." I said with a sigh.

Apparently the plan was to launch Agunimon through the air, and try to get him through the stream. He was loaded into MetalKabutarimon's cannon and was awaiting to be launched.

"Hey, are you sure this will work?" he asked nervously.

"Of course it will, trust me." MetalKabuterimon reassured him.

"And besides, if you land on your head, it won't hurt, because your skull's so thick!" Veenomon added.

"Thank Kei, wait what?" Agunimon asked densely.

"Here we go! 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, blast off!" MetalKabuterimon shouted, blasting Agunimon throughout the sky. He let out a yelp of surprise, which turned into a whoop of thrill. Once he stopped and started to fall head first, it became a scream of terror.

"Oops." MetalKabuterimon muttered, sweat dropping. He looked back at the equation, "Okay… Maybe it was divide by two and carry the pi." he said thoughtfully. "Hey! Agunimon! Ready to try it again?" he yelled.

"Again?!? I can't believe I let you do that in the first place!" he screamed from afar.

We all sighed and wandered in different directions, Kazemon and Veenomon went into the sky to search for ways, Kumamon and Agunimon began to look behind some rocks, KendoGarurumon began his search behind the building, and MetalKabuterimon tried to work out his equation again. I looked in some craters when I saw it. A rocket ship.

"Guys, come here!" I shouted.

The others all sped over and saw the rocket as well. "How'd you find that?" KendoGarurumon asked.

"Well, I just came over, and it was just right here." I answered.

"Amazing." Takuya mumbled.

"Hey! Guys! I figured out how to get back to the Digital World!" MetalKabuterimon yelled, speeding over to us, "All we need is a-"

"Rocket?" Agunimon finished.

"Damn! Where'd that come from?" MetalKabuterimon demanded.

"Our friends built it!" a cheery voice behind us answered. We looked behind us to see Burgermon. "It was just used for testing, but as you can see, it didn't work out very well."

"Hey, can… we use it?" Agunimon asked.

"Of course you can." the Burgermon chirped.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Agunimon asked. "Let's get that thing out of the ground!"

"It's pretty heavy, maybe we can help!" the Digimon all chorused.

"That's so sweet of you all." Veenomon said, smiling.

"Thanks you guys." Agunimon added.

After what seemed like years of manual labor, we finally assembled the rocket. We made a giant makeshift slingshot to launch us throughout the air. The only catch was that we had to do it as soon as the moons aligned.

After saying our goodbyes to the moon dwelling Digimon, we all got into the ship, in our human forms of course, and prepared to launch.

Takuya naturally took up the captain's seat. I sat with my brother, Junpei sat with Tomoki and Keiko, who looked panicked, sat with Izumi. Bokomon, Neemon and Patamon all took refuge in the back.

"We may not remember how we got here, but we'll sure remember how we got back." I chattered nervously.

"The moons are aligned." Izumi said, determination evident in her voice.

"Unfortunately." Keiko added, pushing back into her seat.

"Oh wow, this is exciting." Tomoki said.

"Tell me about it." Junpei said.

"This wait is killing me." Bokomon sighed from the back.

Neemon suggested a sing along, which got him a snapped waistband.

"Alright!" a voice shouted from the outside. "Haley's squall!"

The chain link was broken, sending us throughout the air and back breaking speeds. All was well, until the nose of the ship began pointing down.

"This doesn't feel right!" Bokomon shouted.

"We don't have enough speed." Junpei stated.

Takuya digivolved to BurningGreymon, managing to bring the ship up to speed from the outside.

"Good job Takuya!" Keiko exclaimed.

"Nice work!" Kouji added.

Takuya came back onto the ship and took the wheel once again. We got through the stream and into the atmosphere. Everything was fine except that we were floating.

"This is fun!" Tomoki exclaimed.

"What goes up, must go down!" Neemon squealed.

"Yeah, this could be fun, but I'm over it already." Kouji snapped, he was floating on his side.

Keiko was a giggly mess, she was floating so her belly was down.

"My skirt keeps falling up, or down, or up, or… Oh please don't look." Izumi cried from the back.

"You heard her Junpei." Takuya said defensively.

"What're you looking at me for?" Junpei demanded.

Suddenly the gravity came back, sending us all to the floor. We all landed differently; Kouji landed in his seat perfectly, Izumi landed on top of Junpei in a tangled up mess, Takuya landed on his back, I landed in my seat, a little bit lopsided and Keiko was on her stomach with Tomoki sitting on her butt.

"Sorry Keiko." Tomoki said.

The ship lurched, causing us all to fall forward a bit. We looked through the back window and we saw a pink Trailmon. We must have been on a rail or something.

We got him to push the rocket back to the bottom, in exchange for a good polishing. This world is seriously weird.


	24. Brats

Over 100 reviews!!! Thank God! We've made it so so so far! I'd like to thank all of the reviews, believe me, I couldn't have done it without you!

**Disclaimer: Me no own Digimon. Keiko? Me own Keiko.**

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Kouji POV:

"Thanks for the ride!" Takuya said gratefully.

"I'm just glad I didn't mess it up." the Trailmon said as he chugged slowly away.

We all called out our goodbyes and waved as he left.

"Oh no!" Keiko gasped.

"What's the matter?" Kouichi asked in a worried tone.

"We never polished him." she said.

Takuya and her exchanged looks, before they began giggling like hyenas. They recovered quickly and Takuya cleared his throat, "So, where are we anyway?"

"Steel town, the whole place is made out of steel." Bokomon answered.

"Gee, never would've guessed that from the name." Junpei grunted.

"Wow! It's all shiny and bright!" Tomoki chirped excitedly.

"Yeah." Izumi agreed.

"A bit too shiny." Keiko said softly, shielding her eyes.

"I bet you guys wish you had a cool pair of goggles right now." Takuya said, grinning like a madman.

I scoffed, "Yeah, right. All the _cool _kids wear goggles."

"Well they will." Takuya challenged.

We came across a rock pass, which was large and dark.

"Not so shiny and clean here." Tomoki said quietly.

A big Digimon came running towards us.

**Sagittarimon, half man, half horse, and all mean. His judgment arrow attack is three prongs of pain.**

He stomped his foot on the ground as if in anger. "Stop right there humans. While I have nothing against you personally, I have to demand you to hand over all of your obsessions."

"Obsessions?" Takuya asked in confusion.

"No, wait, I mean your possessions, I should've just said stuff like I usually do. I never should have bought that thesaurus." he rambled. What an imbecile.

"So, you have nothing better to do than to rob us?" Tomoki asked innocently.

"Right. Now, if you don't want to get hurt, hand over your obsessions." Sagittarimon snapped.

"I can't believe we're getting robbed by someone this dumb! You mean _possessions_, right" Junpei snarled.

"Right, that's what I just said, isn't it?" Sagittarimon asked.

"Okay, just give us a sec." Takuya sighed.

We all huddled together, "There's no way he's with the royal knights." Kouichi whispered.

"Yeah, let's just get rid of him and get on our way." Junpei said.

"What's taking so long?" Sagittarimon asked impatiently.

"I'm afraid we're gonna have to say no to that." I snapped.

"What?!?" Sagittarimon was shocked that we said no to him.

"Look, we don't have time for this… So why don't you just leave before you get hurt?" Takuya said.

"Trust me, you're gonna be the one hurting!" Sagittarimon exclaimed, pulling his fist back, preparing to attack. I felt the D-tector in my pocket, preparing to attack, but I didn't get the chance.

"Stop!" a voice shouted from afar. We all, even Sagittarimon, looked over towards the source of the commotion. There, at the top of the rocks were standing human kids. Wait, what? Human kids?!? Three boys and three girls. How weird.

"Who's that?" Takuya asked quietly.

"Human kids." I answered.

"But… But how?" Keiko stammered, confused.

"Well… Perhaps other human kids are working to save the Digital World, too." Bokomon said, his tone indicating that he thought this was normal.

The blonde haired boy, who was obviously the leader, spoke up, "Hey you! Are you the no-good Digimon who's been stealing from everybody?"

"So what if I am?" Sagittarimon replied nonchalantly.

The brunette with glasses spoke next, "Well, you're gonna get it!" he shouted.

"From who? You kids? I could take you guys easily, even if you teamed up with these guys here!" Sagittarimon challenged.

"We're not the ones you should be worrying about." the blonde said with a scoff.

A large Digimon, who looked like a man with angel wings, flew out from behind them.

"Who's that?" Kouichi asked.

"Whoever he is, he sure is impressive!" Izumi exclaimed.

"You got that right." I agreed.

"It's Angemon!" Bokomon exclaimed excitedly.

Patamon looked like he was ready to faint, "I'm gonna be just like him!" he squealed.

**And you could certainly do worse. Angemon has a virtuous and compassionate heart, and few can withstand his hand of fate attack.**

Sagittarimon pulled out his bow, "You asked for it! Judgement arrow!" he exclaimed.

"Can't go wrong with the arrows." Keiko muttered to Takuya.

Angemon deflected it easily, swooped down, and broke the bow.

"What was that? 'You can't go wrong with the arrows'?" Takuya muttered to Keiko, imitating her voice.

Keiko grinned and elbowed him in the side.

"I think you ought to leave." Angemon snarled.

Sagittarimon galloped away, no questions asked.

"Great job Angemon!" the blonde exclaimed, as they walked down the mountain and towards us and their Digimon.

"You kids okay?" the glasses wearing one asked. "Hey! Look it's Tomoki!"

We all looked over at Tomoki in question, who just looked paled. "Tomoki? You okay?" Keiko asked.

**Break mother fucker!**

"So wait, you're telling us you've been in the Digital World the whole time we've been here? You came on the trains, too?" Takuya asked.

"Yep," the blonde said with a bit of arrogance. "After we got off the train, we ended up at the forest terminal with a bunch of other confused kids, I mean we weren't confused like them, but they… Well, you know what I mean. Anyway, we started talking to some other kids and that's how we met Teruo and Chiaki. Then this _chick _told us to all get onboard and get home, but we were like, forget that, this place rocks, we wanna stick around and see what happens next. So, that's what we did. Pretty soon we met Angemon and we've been traveling around ever since. You know, like having adventures, fighting injustices, that kind of stuff."

Four eyes nodded, "It's just like T.V., only we're in it. And sure it's been dangerous, but we have Angemon with us." he said, smiling.

Tomoki whimpered from the corner.

"Hey, Tomoki? We're sorry about picking on you earlier." the blonde said.

"It's really not safe here, you guys should really go home. You should've listened to Ophanimon when she said to go home." I chided.

Teruo, I think that's his name, spoke up, "Ophanimon? Is she the one who's been sending us e-mails on our cell phones?"

"Yeah, we used to get messages all the time from her, but not anymore." Chiaki said, looking at her cell phone.

"Your phones? What, did you get your D-tectors stolen or something?" Junpei asked.

"D-tectors? What's a D-tector?" the glasses wearer asked.

"Okay, we get to ask some questions now, like why are you here?" the blonde asked.

"Actually, we're trying to restore peace to the entire Digital World." Junpei answered.

"World peace?" Four eyes asked.

"Totally groovy." the blonde said sarcastically.

"How are you guys gonna save the entire world by yourselves?" Teruo asked skeptically.

"Yeah, look what you have for Digimon! They couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag!" the blonde exclaimed, getting a whine from Neemon.

"Yeah, it looks like the most those guys could do to save the world, is to volunteer to pick up the trash." Four eyes said, sending laughs through the bench they were all sitting on.

"Yeah? Well we have the spirits of the twelve legendary warriors! So there!" Takuya yelled.

I put my hand in front of his face.

"Well we do." he whimpered. I shook my head at him, now was not the time to argue with these brats.

"They'd probably get hurt even doing that!" the blonde shouted.

"I don't know who the _hell _you think you are, but you need to leave. Now." Keiko snapped.

"It's too dangerous for you all here, you'll just get hurt." Kouichi added. They all looked shocked that Keiko and Kouichi said that. The looks on their faces basically said, 'The audacity!'

"Look at yourselves! You don't even know what you're doing. You'll get yourselves into something you can't get yourselves out of." Keiko exclaimed in exasperation.

"You've been lucky so far, but sooner or later, you're gonna run into something you can't handle." Kouichi preached.

"What do you know?" the blonde demanded.

"We _know _that there's a lot of dangerous stuff out there, like the Royal Knights." I snarled.

"Yeah, they're the reason why pieces of the world keep on disappearing!" Izumi added.

"They want to destroy this whole place, and they don't care who goes with it. And you guys could be next!" Takuya said.

Four eyes stood up, "Hey, you guys can't tell us what to do! You're not our fathers!"

"Yeah! We've been doing just fine!" the blonde added, "Maybe _you're _the little babies that need to go running home to mama!"

"We're outta here." the kid with the glasses said as they left the building.

"And you know what Tomoki?" the blonde called back, "I'm _not _sorry for picking on you!"

"How mature of you!" Keiko shouted back.

There was silence for a moment, "Good riddance to bad rubbish is all I've got to say. Anyway, it's all out of our hands now." Junpei sighed.

We, as in Takuya, Keiko, Kouichi, Bokomon, Neemon, Patamon and myself, all got up and left as well, "Junpei's right, we can't be worrying about those guys. Come on! We have enough worries of our own." Takuya said in a laid back tone.

"And besides, we did warn them. It's not our fault they didn't listen." Bokomon sighed.

"But we can't let them go off on their own and get in trouble, it just wouldn't be… right!" I said.

"Hey look, we did everything we could, okay? Yeeeah… Just trust me on this one." Takuya said stubbornly.

"Why? Have you been right before?" Neemon asked.

"Well, sure, at least once." Patamon confirmed.

"Most of the time, the right thing to do is easy to see. If you'e willing to look, and do what's necessary." Angemon said.

"Angemon!" Keiko gasped.

"Ophanimon foresaw the wickedness coming to the Digital World and knew she might not survive. But she still stood up against the forces of darkness. She also saw that humans could help defeat the evil ones, but she didn't know which humans would succeed. So she risked putting them all in danger and brought them to the Digital World. Luckily, most of them were brave enough to swallow their pride and leave when she asked. Those four remained, and as Ophanimon ordered I have continued to protect them." he said.

"Why?" Kouichi asked.

"Wait, what you should do is send them home, you know how dangerous this world is! Plus, you could be helping us defeat the Royal Knights, or something, instead of babysitting that bunch of selfish brats! You have to explain to them that they have to go home! And if that doesn't work, then just throw them onto a Trailmon!" Takuya snapped.

"I have tried to explain many times, but they will not leave, so I must protect them." Angemon said, staying cool.

"He's just doing what's necessary." Bokomon said.

"What do you mean?" Takuya asked.

"You can't blame him if they decided to stay, and maybe they're not wrong for wanting to stay and make something of themselves." Bokomon scolded Takuya.

"He has a point, if someone said you were useless and tried to send you home, what would you do?" I asked. I understood Bokomon's logic.

"You'd probably stay and try to prove them wrong, right?" Keiko asked. Apparently she understood Bokomon's logic as well.

"I don't know." Takuya said in a whiny voice.

"Well I do, that'd be the first, second and third thing you'd do. At least after complaining." Bokomon said.

"Or shooting your mouth off." Keiko added.

"Jeez you guys, change your mind, much? Fine. We'll help them or send them home. Or whatever." Takuya finally said with an exasperated sigh.

There was a sudden explosion on the side of a building not far away. As soon as it happened, the blonde kid, his four eyed friend and Tomoki came running out of the building behind us. "What was that?" the blonde asked.

"Our friend is back." Takuya answered, standing defensively.

There he was. Sagittarimon. The baka. He was standing there surrounded by a clique of other horse-man hybrids. "Yeah I'm back! And I brought some friends of my own!" he exclaimed.

**Centarumon isn't too big on brains, but he's huge on brawn. And his solar ray attack **_**won't **_**brighten up your day!**

"This is what you all get. For not handing over your obsessions!" Sagittarimon shouted.

"You mean possessions, not obsessions." Takuya, Keiko, Kouichi and I all corrected him in unison.

"I know what I mean! I have a mind like a steel flap!" he shouted angrily.

"Wha?" Keiko blurted out.

"Ready to attack?" Sagittarimon asked his army. They all let out whoops and hollers in reply. "Go!" he yelled.

"Get out of the way guys! We'll handle this!" the blonde yelled from behind us.

"Look, just stay out of the way, you'll all get hurt!" Takuya shouted.

"_We'll _get hurt?!?" Four eyes asked incredulously, "Angemon can fight him!"

"I'll handle this! Katsuharu, you and the others find a place to hole up out of harm's way!" Angemon said.

Katsuharu… So _that's _his name.

Angemon charged forward, into the army of Digimon and fought.

"What do we do?" Izumi asked, who just ran up with Junpei.

"I… I don't know. Should we spirit evolve?" Takuya pondered.

"Just leave it to Angemon. He'll take care of you kids." Katsuharu cooed.

"He's a fighting machine, and there ain't no one in the whole world who can stand against him!" Four eyes exclaimed all triumphant-like.

Suddenly more Centarumon appeared, charging up from the side. "It's a trap!" Kouichi exclaimed.

"Yeah, and we fell right into it!" Takuya yelled.

They all charged straight for Tomoki and the two clowns with him. As they ran, Four eyes tripped and fell.

"Teppei!" Katsuharu shouted.

Teppei… So _that's _his name.

"Katsuharu! Help me!" Teppei exclaimed from the ground. Why he didn't just _stand up _was beyond me, but he just laid there like a rock.

Katsuharu fled, leaving the kid on his own. How noble.

Before he was trampled by the Centarumon, Tomoki grabbed him, and pulled him out of the way. I've gotta give the kid props, he's extremely brave for being so young. Tomoki got up and beast spirit evolved into Korikkakumon, preparing to fight the brainless wonder Digimon. He swumg one of his axes and launched a great number of them into the air.

"Come on, let's help him out!" Takuya exclaimed.

"Execute! Spirit evolution!""Agunimon!"

"Lobomon!"

"Lowemon!"

"Veenomon!"

"Kazemon!"

"Beetlemon!"

"Pyro Punch!"

"Lobo kendo!"

"Shadow lance!"

"Love shot!"

"Hurricane wave!"

"Lightning blitz!"

We easily defeated the Digimon. As I said before, they really were brainless wonders. We all devolved to out normal selves.

"Man, we're good." Takuya said.

"No. We're bad." Keiko said, grinning.

"We're so bad, that we're…" Takuya began.

"Super bad!" they yelled in unison, doing a chest bump.

"Sorry," Katsuharu said, putting out his hand to Tomoki. "I shouldn't have called you weak, because you're stronger than I've ever been."

"You saved my life." Teppei added, blushing.

Tomoki smiled and shook Katsuharu's hand.

"It would be an honor, if you'd let me call you my friend." Katsuharu said, hope evident in his voice.

"Sure." Tomoki said.

"Well guys, it's our turns to be brave and do something we don't want to do. We've had a great time here, but these guys are right, it's too dangerous. So I think we'd better leave." Katsuharu said with a sigh.

"Seriously?" Teruo asked. No, he's just kidding. Duh.

"Yep." Katsuharu confirmed.

The wind began to blow abnormally, and we all looked up.

"How moving." Crusadermon cooed.

"The Royal Knights." I snarled.

"It would be even more moving if you were defeated." she said, sighing.

"That would be a nice comeback if it even made sense!" Keiko shouted.

"We'll just have to take care of you little runts!" Dynasmon said.

"Not so fast!" Angemon yelled. He charged up to them, preparing to attack, but Dynasmon was too fast. All it took was one swipe to destroy him.

"Angemon! No!" Katsuharu yelled.

"Laser lock!" Crusadermon exclaimed, trapping Teppei, Katsuharu, Teruo and Chiaki in a glowing net.

"Now, now! Not everybody is lucky enough to be trapped by someone as beautiful as me!" Crusadermon exclaimed vainly.

Dynasmon swooped down and grabbed the children, flying away with them. Tomoki, who was right next to the bag, chased after it and grabbed the bottom, getting pulled away with them.

"Tomoki!" Keiko and Izumi screamed.

"Bring them back, you ugly tin can! Come back here!" Takuya yelled.

Crusadermon landed in front of us, "Scarlet tempest!" she exclaimed, sending a flurry of rose petals around the six of us. Which surprisingly hurt, considering they were… Petals.

"Tomoki! No!" Junpei yelled as they were taken away to Gods knows where.

* * *

Hello there my pretties! Since I'm in such a generous mood, I'm going to give you a very small preview of the sequel to Digimon Frontier Refreshed:

Keiko stared at him angrily and pulled his hair up, snipping off a huge piece.

He shrugged, "It'll grow back."

Keiko stared at him with even more ferocity than before, then kicked him between the legs with so much force, that Takuya, Kouichi, Junpei, Keiko's brothers and I all flinched. He fell to his knees with a gasp for air as tears formed in his eyes.

"Grow those back." Keiko snapped, then walked away.

Saburo followed her suit, but stopped at the boy on the ground, "Yeah, that's _my _sister!" he said with a laugh, before following her out.

Alright, that was a part you won't be seeing for a while, but know one thing. The kid who was kicked, wasn't anyone you've met in my story, so don't freak out. Oh, and Saburo is Keiko's older brother. He's the youngest of the three male Takishitas. Well, you _may _see one more preview in my fic. Not until the end though. I might give you a longer one too! Imagine that! Well, have a nice night! And review! Or else, I'll hunt your ass down. Thanks.


	25. Pedestal

Updates are so very fun. And I'm so very tired...

**DISCLAIMER: KairiTakishita doesn't own Digimon. But she does own Keiko.**

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Keiko POV:

We all screamed for the Royal Knights to let Tomoki go, but to no avail. He was gone.

"We'll find you!" Takuya yelled as they disappeared into the distance.

"Wow! They're gone!" Neemon chirped.

"We can all see that Neemon." Bokomon snapped.

"Let's move." Takuya roared.

"I wouldn't do that," a voice said from behind us. We all turned around to see a large group of Trailmon. "Tracking them down could be dangerous."

"Trailmon!" Takuya exclaimed excitedly.

"You might as well just forget 'em." one of them said.

"But they're our friends." Takuya replied.

"They'll probably send you a postcard... Someday…" another said.

"What?" Izumi muttered.

"We can't leave them. We need to help them." I said softly.

"You can't do that, they're at Beanstalk Village." the blue one said.

"Beanstalk Village?" Takuya inquired.

"Bingo. What would you call a village with a huge beanstalk growing out of the middle of it?" one asked.

That's an easy one. Vine Town. Plant Plaza. Bean City. Stalk County. Green Village… I was a little lost in my thoughts, thinking about other ways to say Beanstalk Village, so when all the Trailmon left, I didn't really notice.

"Where are you going?" I called, as they all sped away.

"Cowards." Kouji muttered angrily.

We heard loud snoring coming from the station and we all turned to see a Trailmon snoozing. Junpei ran up to him, "Rise and shine! All aboard for Beanstalk Village!" No reply.

Takuya zoomed up to the Trailmon and began to tickle him, eliciting little giggling sounds from it. Soon Junpei joined in, causing the Trailmon to sneeze, which ended in Takuya and Junpei flying away and into the tracks.

"Hey! What was that about? Come on, I'm trying to get some shut eye here!" he steamed out.

Izumi smiled at me, then sauntered over to the Trailmon. "I just love that you're so outspoken, you think a big tick charged Trailmon could help me out?" she asked, hugging the Trailmon. I would've joined Izumi's little 'Persuasion by sexiness' idea. If I knew how.

"Well sure, you could just call me Wormy." he said, grinning.

"Actually, we could all use your help. We need a ride to Beanstalk Village." Kouji said.

"No! You practically scare my wheels off yelling at me, and now you expect me to give you a lift?" he demanded.

"Yeah!" Takuya exclaimed. He somehow managed to wriggle his way on top of the Trailmon, holding on for dear life. The Trailmon didn't really _like _that plan. He began to chug forward, angry as ever.

"Come on you guys! Get on!" Takuya shouted from the top. Kouji and Kouichi got in on one side, while I jumped into the other side, pulling Izumi in after me. Junpei wasn't on though.

"Run Junpei!" Izumi yelled. Junpei ran faster, trying to get to the door. He was getting ready to jump in, Izumi sitting in the doorway. "Now jump!" she yelled. Junpei jumped into the train, landing on Izumi.

"Sorry Izumi!" he exclaimed, rolling off of her clumsily. Izumi, who's face was all red, stood up and walked to a seat, plopping herself down.

"Well, that sure worked out, didn't it?" Junpei asked, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Sure did, we got lucky." Izumi said, smiling.

Takuya walked into our car, "Everyone make it?" he asked.

"Yep. Amazing, considering how fast Worm took off." Kouji said, looking out the window.

"Yeah, at least now he's calmed down." Takuya said. As soon as he spoke, Worm stopped, causing us all to flail all over the place. As Worm skidded to a halt we all looked out the window. Nothing was really there. There was a huge cliff, but no tracks. We couldn't go any further. We all got off the train to inspect the tracks.

"Oh man!" Izumi exclaimed.

I sighed, staring down at the huge drop, we could've fallen down _that _if Worm wasn't careful. Ugh… Vertigo…

"If there were tracks, I'd be more than willing to take yous all across!" Worm said.

But we had a plan.

"Oh don't worry Worm, you'll get your tracks." I said, grinning and walking with the others behind him. We managed to take apart the tracks and build a new set. It didn't quite reach across the huge cliff, but it was close enough.

"I wouldn't even bother. The land I run on gets thinner everyday. These Royal Knights are only getting stronger, and you're only getting weaker. It's no use." Worm said.

What if he's right? What if we do lose? And hurt other innocent Digimon along the way? What would it be like if we didn't listen and one of us was hurt? We would feel so guilty for not listening to Worm. But worst of all, what if one of us was killed?

"No." Takuya said firmly, walking over to the tracks to take them apart further. "I'm not ever gonna give up. Tomoki, Katsuharu and the others are waiting for us to rescue them. I'm not gonna let them down. If we just keep believing in ourselves and moving forward, we'll win! We'll do whatever it takes to save this world, right?"

Izumi had tears in her eyes from Takuya's rant, "That's right!"

"Let's face it, the Digital World is kind of like our second home." Takuya added, smiling.

"You call this place home? And you really think you guys can save it? You humans got a lot of bravery, but how are you gonna save this place?" Worm asked softly.

"I don't have a set plan, but if we humans join up with all you Digimon, I know we can do it! And before you know it, you'll be racing around a Digital World that's in one piece again!" Takuya said, smiling.

"When you put it that way, well, that sounds kind of great!" Worm replied. "Well, let's make some tracks!"

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"Whoa!" Worm yelled as we soared throughout the air, jumping over the chasm that had originally held us back.

"Now Worm's on our side, that'll make this ride smooth!" Takuya said, grinning.

The ground lurched out from under us and we all flew in different directions. Has Takuya ever heard of jinxing things? We went through loops, over hills, into tunnels, in the air and every other possible thing that's unsafe to go through on a train. Once it was finally over, the six of us were scattered all over the place. I was sitting on something sturdy, yet soft.

"Keiko." a voice muttered.

"Yeah?" I asked, looking around the train for whoever called my name.

"Can you get _off of me_?!?" the voice exclaimed stressfully.

I looked down and realized I was sitting on Kouji. Kouji of all people, he would probably bite my head off.

"Shoot! I'm so sorry Kouji!" I said, slightly tumbling off of his back.

"It's fine." he said, standing up and brushing himself off.

Kouji's come a long way. I mean, he went from this 'jerk who would never talk, and when he did he tore you apart' kind of guy, to this 'I don't mind if you land on top of me, in fact I'm going to even crack a smile because I'm so happy' kind of guy. Long way.

We all went to the doors, "Katsuharu, Tomoki!" Takuya yelled on he opened a door.

"We're all fine!" Tomoki's voice chirped from next to the giant beanstalk. Tomoki's voice never sounded better. He was taken out of his confines and he ran over to us, holding his D-tector.

"Takuya, Kouji, you've gotta digivolve!" Junpei said.

They nodded and unity spirit evolved into EmporerGreymon and MagnaGarurumon, then launched into battle with the Royal Knights. Meanwhile, the rest of us helped load the Digimon onto Worm. Suddenly, Kouichi was grabbed by Crusadermon's ribbon. Because she's a serious bitch.

"Kouichi! Stop! Don't you hurt him." Kouji spat.

"What? Oh, _I _see, you won't attack because you wish to protect this human." she gathered, squeezing Kouichi tighter in his confines, causing him to yelp in pain.

We all began to yell for Kouji to kill her, because she's a piece of pink trash.

"Your slings and arrows fall short, because I am beauty personified compared to you homely humans." she said.

"Wow. Take a bow." Izumi said.

"Yeah, she's all that." Junpei added.

"What's it like up there on your pedestal?" I asked.

The little metal Digimon attacked Crusadermon, causing her to swing Kouichi around, and eventually drop him. MagnaGarurumon leapt forward and caught him in the knick of time.

"Thanks a lot Kouji." Kouichi said, smiling.

"Why sure, anytime brother." Kouji replied, beaming down at Kouichi.

I will not cry. I will not cry. I let out a sniffle and Izumi looked at me. She sniffled too. So I'm not alone.

"I just love brotherly love." I said softly.

"Me too." Izumi said, smiling. _This _we would have to talk about later. Right now, though, Takuya and Kouji were getting thrashed. They didn't look too well either. Bad sign.

"Royal Knights stop! The key you seek is at the top of the beanstalk! It is a golden pod, and when you take it from there, the lock will be undone." the elder of the metal Digimon said.

The Royal Knights immediately took the code, causing the land to disappear. All we could do was leave.

"It's completely gone." Takuya said as we sat on the only refuge we could see, a piece of a station.

"The beanstalk, and your village, too." Tomoki whispered.

"It's sad. Katsuharu, now you and your friends must leave this world." the elder said softly.

"Not without taking you Mamemon. We'll find you a place to live!" Katsuharu said.

"We will not leave the Digital World, this place is our home. We can always find another place to build. But if we were to lose dear friends like you, that would _truly _be a tragedy. We can always plant another bean and nurture it's possibilities," the elder pulled a seed out. "Who knows, this one might even grow bigger than the last."

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"Why are you all staying here?" Chiaki asked as we stood in the station where we all met, saying our goodbyes.

"We've still got a lot of stuff we need to take care of here." Takuya answered.

"Tomoki, why don't you come back with us?" Teppei inquired.

"Nah, I've gotta stay right here to help save this place. We have lots of Digimon friends, just like you do. We can't let them down." Tomoki said.

"We're counting on you." Katsuharu said.

"Thanks." Tomoki replied, smiling.

"Well, good luck." Teppei said softly. Katsuharu pushed them all back into Worm playfully.

"Careful you guys." Katsuharu said. He lingered at the entrance. "Tomoki. Your turn." he said, pointing at his back.

"What?" Tomoki asked.

"Give _me _a shove this time." he said.

Tomoki grinned and pushed Katsuharu into the Trailmon. The door shut behind them, bringing them home. Home. We all wanted to be home right now, but we had a duty. And that duty was to-

"Keiko, about that brotherly love thing..." Izumi said, grinning.

Everybody looked over at us, shocked. Kouji looked disgusted. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"…"

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Reviews make me type faster! THINK ABOUT THAT!!!

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	26. The Creature of the Black Lagoon

This is just a very quick fill in chapter. I've always wanted to torture Keiko… Muahaha.

**Disclaimer: I wish I owned Digimon, but I don't. I'm glad I own Keiko though!

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Keiko POV:

"How are we supposed to cross this?" Tomoki whimpered, staring into the bubbling mud.

"We don't need food _that _bad." Izumi said softly.

"Are you crazy? Yes we do!" Junpei exclaimed, raising his hands in the air for emphasis.

"There's no other way around this, either." Kouichi muttered.

The mud was almost like a giant puddle, covering our whole path.

"I'm sure we could just jump across!" Takuya exclaimed enthusiastically.

"Yeah right, it's at least seven feet long." Kouji scowled.

Takuya pouted and while Junpei freaked out, "Well how are we supposed to get food? This is our only stop for a long time, then right back on the Trailmon! We need to get food, or I'll starve to death!" Junpei whined.

"I could try." I said softly. It didn't look too bad, it was probably only a foot or so deep. I peeled off my shoes and socks, "Can you hold these?" I asked Izumi. She nodded and took them in her hand, smiling.

"Are you sure that's a good idea, Keiko." Neemon chirped.

I took a step closer to the mud, "Sure it is, the worst that'll happen is that I'll get my legs muddy." I said, putting my foot on the surface of the mud. "It's probably only a couple feet dee-" I was cut off by my own shriek as I flew into the mud, completely engulfed. I kept sinking lower, even after I was completely under, and realized it wasn't a couple feet deep, I was still sinking lower. It must've been at least six feet deep. I managed to wriggle back up, my head breaking the surface.

Now I was thoroughly freaked out, I was covered in mud, but I could still move. It was thick, but not so thick that I couldn't get out.

"Are you okay?" Tomoki asked.

"Ew, ew, ew! Eww! This is so gross!" I shrieked. I began to paddle to the other side and pulled myself out of the mud. I was completely covered in the goo, "YUCK!" I yelled.

"Look guys, a path!" Takuya exclaimed.

And surely enough, there was a path, sitting right there. We didn't even notice.

"What?!? No! You guys had better go through the mud, too! That is so not fair!" I exclaimed.

"Well, Keiko. _You _volunteered." Junpei snickered.

"_You _were the one who needed the food so badly!" I yelled back. To my dismay the others walked on the path, meeting me on the other side. Once they came over, I was pissed off. I was just sitting there on the ground.

"Keiko looks like a monster!" Patamon giggled.

"She kind of does, the creature from the black lagoon." Izumi added.

"Or the mud puddle!" Tomoki jeered, causing everybody to laugh at me.

"It's not funny." I snarled, standing up.

"Look! She's completely covered!" Kouji laughed.

"Really? Lemme see!" Takuya said, moving to get a better view.

I snatched my shoes and socks away from Izumi and stomped into the forest.

"Where are you going?" Kouichi called.

"I heard a river a little ways away." I sighed.

"Why would you go there?" Neemon asked.

"_Because--_ Neemon-- I'm covered in mud, and I want to get cleaned up." I said, trying to control my anger.

"Good luck!" Izumi called as I walked away.

"Thanks, I'll need it." I called as I walked away. Okay, maybe it was a _little _funny.


	27. Waterfalls

Hi guys. Sorry it's been forever. Also, I'm sorry I haven't been replying to reviews either, but I promise I'll start, I shouldn't ignore my readers. Well, without further ado, here's the next chapter.

**Disclaimer: You're a stupid idiot if you really think I own Digimon.**

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Keiko POV:

"Wow!" I exclaimed to myself when I saw the huge waterfall in front of me. There was also a small pond filled with freshwater which the waterfall emptied into. It was absolutely beautiful.

I looked down at myself and cringed, I was absolutely disgusting. I sighed and peeled off my clothes, unable to stop being paranoid and look around me to see if people were there.

I finally got into the lukewarm water and sunk in. It was nice. Finally having a minute to myself where I wasn't fighting an evil Digimon or running for my life in a forest. It gave me time to think. And when I thought, I could only think of my new friends. And how… how happy I was. I could finally say that I was really truly happy. At home I was content, but here I had friends. I didn't have to worry about being perfect. You see, at home, my brothers expected me to do everything perfectly. Dance, soccer, volleyball. And even when I led the soccer team to the championship, it was as if it was never enough for them. I tried so hard to be perfect. And in the eyes of a lot of people, I was. I was dubbed the perfect girl. Perfect friends. Perfect looks. Perfect life. But I wasn't even close. Actually, I was the opposite. But here… here I feel like it doesn't matter, that nobody cares about those things. I'm happy. And in the real world, I'll have the courage to tell my brothers how I feel. And things will finally get better.

"Keiko? Did you drown or something?" a voice called.

"Coming!" I yelled back. I got out and pulled my clothes out of the water as well, wringing them out and pulling the damp clothes on.

"Ready?" Kouichi asked once I got back.

"Yep!" I replied.

I was ready. Ready to leave. Ready for the real world. Ready to have a fresh start.

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Yes. Keiko has a little moment to herself to think. I thought she needed to have that, even if it's super short. Well, please read and review!


	28. A promise

Thanks for the support about my ankle and Miami and everything. I love you all so much! So here's a chapter!

**Disclaimer: OBVIOUSLY I don't own Digimon.

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**Kouji POV:**

Keiko came back all smiley and happy and skippy, grinning like a maniac. "What did you snort?" I asked.

She smiled, "Nothing, I'm just happy." she replied. We began to wander through the forest.

"Keiko, seriously, why are you so happy?" Takuya asked, slowing down from the front and walking next to her.

"Nothing!" she replied, still smiling.

It was quiet for a minute.

"Okay, when I was at the waterfall thingy, I started thinking. And I realized, I needed a fresh start. And maybe the best way to have a fresh start is to surround myself with good people." she said, looking around to all of us, "In life, I never did things for myself, but for my family and other people. And it's time for me to do things for Keiko."

I felt a smile cross my features, other people were smiling as well. "That's good Keiko." Izumi said, grinning.

"Yeah, it's making me excited to go back to the real world and start over again." she replied.

"We all need to start over, but it will be easy with each other there." Takuya said.

"We'll all still hang out in the real world, right?" Tomoki asked, stopping our group from walking.

"Of course!" Junpei exclaimed.

"We'll always be together, through thick and thin." Kouichi added.

"Forever." I muttered, a little embarrassed.

"And that's a promise." Keiko said softly, taking all of our hands and putting them in the middle, making a pact with each other.

A promise was made that day. A promise we would always keep.

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Just a happy chappie! Please enjoy!


	29. Preview 1: Shinya

This, my friends, is finally a preview for the sequel to Digimon Frontier Refreshed. It's a Kouji and Takuya friendship bit, with a bit of Kouichi and Keiko being encouraging. How fun.

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. But I own Keiko, so don't use her without my permission, then it would be fine.**

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****Kouji POV:**

"I think it should be you." Kouichi said softly as we stood outside of the hospital.

"Me? Why me?" I asked.

"Well, if Takuya wants to talk to anybody, I think it'd be you." Keiko said, softly.

"I don't know. I think it should be Kouichi." I insisted.

"Kouji, you're the only one who can bring him out of this." Kouichi said.

"If anybody can do it, it's you." Keiko added.

"Fine." I hissed, walking through the sliding doors into the hospital lobby, which was connected to the waiting room. The only person in there was Takuya, which was good, we needed to be alone for this. I took a seat next to him, and he didn't move a muscle. He was sitting there dejectedly, hunched over in his seat, his elbows on his knees and his nose and below in his hands.

"Hey." I said.

He looked over at me, "Hey." he replied, moving his hands from his face.

"How're you doing?" I asked. I didn't really know what to say to him.

He shook his head, "I think the part that really gets me, is that I couldn't do anything to stop this all from happening. I'm his big brother, I'm supposed to protect him from shit like this."

"You're his big brother, yes. You're not his guardian, Takuya. You couldn't control that car if you wanted to. Things happen that we can't control, and that was one of the things." I replied.

Takuya nodded, "I just… I can't help but feel like this is my fault. Like my parents are ashamed and the doctors are ashamed and… I just…" he stopped and buried his face in his hands.

I didn't know what to do again, but then I thought back to the time that Keiko comforted Izumi during one of her break-ups. I was Takuya's best friend. I had to be a best friend. I put a hand on his back and rubbed a comforting circle on it. "Hey, don't think about that. You couldn't do anything, it's not your fault. Shinya will be fine."

"But what if he's not fine next time?" he almost yelled, pulling from my touch, "What if he's hurt or worse and I can't do anything about it? I'm supposed to protect him and I can't Kouji!" he cried.

I felt pity for him, more than I had felt for anyone. I felt I could only do one thing. I opened my arms. He hesitated for a moment then he fell into them, crying onto my shoulder. And thinking only about Takuya, I held onto him, whispered things in his ear and rubbed his back. I guess that being a best friend has a lot of downs, too.

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How sweet! Sniff sniff. Well, there'll be more drama and angst (TRUST ME) in this, but also we'll be getting a deeper look at the characters. This wasn't terribly dramatic, but you'll see some serious things happening, and you'll be like "Natalie!" Well, my ankle hurts, so I'm going to beddd. Night. Oh! Review, how could I forget to nag you all?


	30. Preview 2: Love and flours

Gyah! I know, I know. You all really want me to get on with the story, but i just got really excited about the sequel, so I'm just going to give you one more small taste until I go on, okay? I promise this'll be the last irrelevant chapter.

**Disclaimer: Eh. I don't own Digimon. If you didn't know that, then you are a loser and a dope and you need to pay some damn attention.

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**Takuya POV:**

Izumi and I walked to the front of the room and gave our 'baby' to the teacher. Ms. Tanaka looked over the bag of flour, checking for any tears of punctures in the sack. She nodded and grinned, "Great job, you two. The baby looks great." she praised.

Izumi and I smiled and then we walked back to our seats, high-fiving discreetly. We got to the table where Keiko and Tamotsu **(1)** were sitting. Keiko for some reason was clutching the bag of flour tightly to her chest, her normally tan face abnormally pale.

"Keiko? What's wrong?" Izumi asked softly.

Keiko shut her eyes tightly and shook her head, looking down at her feet. Tamotsu looked at her and hesitantly put a hand on her arm, "Keiko, what's the matter?" he asked.

Keiko buried her face in the sack of flour, "It's nothing." she whimpered.

"Keiko and Tamotsu?" Ms. Tanaka called.

Tamotsu stood up, looking at Keiko, who was still sitting there. "Keiko? She called our names." he said softly, holding a hand out to her. Keiko looked up, her face looking utterly desperate for something. She took his hand and he helped her out of her seat, leading her to the desk. Keiko shakily gave the sack of flour to the teacher.

"Wow, you guys really took care of your baby." she said, looking at the sack of flour all over, "Not one blemish." she added.

"Because we love Maiko." Keiko said softly, her face looking devastated.

"Maiko?" Ms. Tanaka asked.

"That's her name, Maiko." Keiko insisted, her voice shaky.

Tamotsu looked at Keiko with a puzzled expression, then turned around to look at us questioningly.

"You guys did a great job, you can take your seats now." Ms Tanaka said, smiling softly.

Tamotsu nodded and started heading back, but he stopped when he noticed Keiko standing there, looking broken.

"Keiko?" Tamotsu asked softly, walking back to Keiko and laying a hand on her shoulder.

"Can't we keep her?" Keiko whimpered Ms. Tanaka.

"What? The baby?" Ms. Tanaka asked, receiving a nod from Keiko. "I'm afraid not, we need to keep them all, my next class has to start the project, and we have just enough."

"What? You're… you're giving the babies away that quickly?" Keiko cried.

"We have to." Ms. Tanaka said, giving a concerned look to the distressed brunette.

"But… but what if the next pair that gets Maiko don't take care of her?" Keiko asked, her voice quivering.

"Then they fail." Ms. Tanaka replied.

"B-but… Maiko… and I-I…" she froze, staring at the sack of flour with a look of pain.

Tamotsu looked at Keiko, his face looking absolutely shocked and confused, "Keiko, are you-" Tamotsu didn't get to finish his sentence due to Keiko throwing herself at him and breaking down completely. She began to sob uncontrollably into his chest, her arms wrapped tight around him.

Ms. Tanaka looked as shocked as Tamotsu did. "Keiko? Oh… um… Tamotsu, why don't you take Keiko somewhere else?" she asked, seeming unconfident in her decision.

"O-okay." he said. He pulled Keiko's arms softly, "Keiko? We're gonna go now, okay?" he said, his tone soft. Keiko let out another sob and pushed her face farther into his chest. Tamotsu looked around, unsure of how to handle the situation. In a split second decision, he bent down and lifted Keiko's legs off the ground, carrying her bridal style out of the room quickly. Once the pair departed, silence overtook the room. Suddenly…

"That's so sweet! Keiko's going to make an amazing mother!" a girl squealed.

"I envy her!"

"She must be amazing with kids!"

The room went into an uproar about how great Keiko would be if she had a child and all that jazz. Izumi and I exchanged weary glances before we simultaneously lowered our heads onto the table.

*****End of the school day*****

**Keiko POV:**

That was embarrassing. I really can't believe I did that. I just… that stupid sack of flour, and I went through so much taking care of it, and I _finally _got to hang out with Tamotsu after such a long time and… I sighed and shut my locker. I really didn't understand why I was so upset about Mai - err, the flour sack.

"Keiko!" a voice called. I turned around to see Tamotsu run up to me, something in his arms.

"Tamotsu." I said softly, embarrassment overcoming my ability to be confident.

"Hey, I wanted to give you this." he said. He handed my a sack of flour.

"Maiko?" I inquired.

"Yeah, you see, the guy who got Maiko is on my soccer team, and I just figured I could take it off of his hands for his and his partner's month. So he said we could take care of it for him." he said, running his fingers through his sandy blonde hair.

"You really did that?" I asked softly. He let out a nervous cough, nodding slightly. "Tamotsu…" I put Maiko in my left arm and reached out to hug him with my right, "Thanks so much." I said, smiling up at him.

"It's not problem." he replied, laughing in his boyish manner. "Well, I've got to go, my older brother's waiting… I can't help take care of Maiko tonight, but tomorrow you can come over, and we'll take care of her, okay?" he asked.

"Uh, yeah. Yeah, of course. I'll see you then." I replied, smiling.

"Okay, see you." he said, turning and walking away with a wave.

"Bye." I said, more to myself than to him. Tamotsu. Maybe… maybe I wasn't sad because I was leaving Maiko, but because I was leaving Tamotsu. The feeling is so strange. But I think that maybe… I _like _him.

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**(1) Tamotsu will be a character in the sequel. You'll see him quite often as one of Keiko's childhood friends and Takuya's teammate.**

Ooh la la. I love Tamotsu. He's a cool bitch. Okay, please review, even if this is another preview. ((gets shot)) Fine, you don't really have to review the previews. ((gets unshot)) But it would be nice. ((gets shot again))


	31. Singin in the Rain

This chapter was requested by **Sydneybell24**. She desperately wanted Keiko and him to have a moment, so it will be here. Seriously, I love her. She has been the funniest little freak ever. You'd be lucky if she reviewed your fics. So, everybody bow down to the great Sydneybell24!!! **This is for her!**

Also, here are some poll results senoritas. **I only count them if they are in the actual poll.**

1. Kouji. 15 votes. 51 percent.

2. Kouichi. 6 votes. 20 percent.

3. Takuya. 5 votes. 17 percent.

4. Izumi. 2 votes. 6 percent.

5. Junpei. 1 vote. 3 percent.

6. Tomoki. 0 votes. 0 percent.

Geez. A lot of Koujeiko fans apparently. We'll just have to see my friends. Thanks for all your votes and reviews!

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon nor do I own Singin in the rain, although I memorized the whole dance. Heh.**

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"Why's the sky so dark?" Tomoki asked, his voice a bit shaky.

I looked up as well and noticed it, "It looks like it's going to storm out." The clouds were moving over us, and it looked like it was ready to pour.

"This is Rainfall Forest. Here, there are severe thunderstorms every few days, it gets so bad, that there's mud slides and river floods." Bokomon explained, sounding a bit nervous.

"Then I suggest we go fast." Kouji said as he sped up the pace a little bit. We all complied, walking a bit faster to get out quicker. Lightning flashed and thunder sounded loudly in the forest.

"I'm scared!" Tomoki cried, latching onto a tree.

"It's okay Tomoki!" Takuya said, walking over to him and getting onto his knee, "It's just rain, there's nothing to be afraid of! We all love rain! Right, guys?" he turned around and looked at us hopefully.

"Of course! Rain is so fun!" Izumi chirped. Thunder crashed again, causing Tomoki to yelp and latch onto Takuya.

"Yeah! Why do you think there would be so many songs about rain?" I asked enthusiastically.

"What songs?" Tomoki asked softly.

"Er… like… like 'Singing in the Rain'!" I exclaimed.

"I've never heard of that song." Tomoki said, pushing his face into Takuya's shoulder.

"Never heard of 'Singing in the Rain'? Well, we'll have to sing while we walk. Anytime it rains, I sing that song." I said, smiling at him.

"Okay…" said Tomoki reluctantly. We began to walk at a fast pace again.

"Umm… how do we start?" Izumi asked with a nervous laugh.

"Heh. I was thinking the same thing." I replied with a giggle. Thunder boomed again, causing a Tomoki to sob hysterically.

"Sing you guys!" Kouji whispered harshly from in front.

Izumi began, "I'm singing in the rain, just singing in the rain. What a glorious feelin', I'm happy again." she looked over at me red faced with embarrassment. Thunder smashed again, causing whimpers from Tomoki."I'm laughing at clouds, so dark up above. The sun's in my heart, and I'm ready for love." I sang, trying not to laugh.

Izumi and I looked at each other again, determination evident on our faces. "Let the stormy clouds chase, everyone from the place. Come on with the rain, I've a smile on my face." By now we were skipping around and yelling over the thunder. This was actually quite amusing, "I walk down the lane, with a happy refrain! Just singin', singin' in the rain!"

Right about then was where the problem started. Without warning a downpour started, drenching us within seconds, and scaring the crap out of the majority of us. Tomoki yelped and clutched onto Takuya even tighter. Takuya grabbed Tomoki quickly. Patamon flew into Bokomon's waistband and somehow Neemon managed to as well. Junpei did an oh-so manly shriek, Izumi and I screamed and hugged and Kouji and Kouichi just stood there.

"Come on! It's only r-rain!" Takuya yelled over the deafening sounds of the rainfall.

"B-but we can barely see two feet in front of us!" Izumi yelled shakily.

"We'll just link together!" Kouichi yelled.

Kouichi's a genius. Takuya took the lead, holding Kouichi's hand. Kouichi was holding onto Kouji's hand, and then after that, it was, Tomoki, myself, Izumi and Junpei, who had Bokomon, Neemon and Patamon all riding on this shoulders.

The wind was now whipping and the ground seemed like it was deteriorating out from under us.

That's when the disaster struck. Lightning hit a tree only a few feet away from us, causing a chain of events: Tomoki screamed and ran away, causing Takuya to chase after him. Patamon got caught in the wind and was whipped away. And lastly, Junpei slammed into me, causing me to fall down a hill and into a river, bringing some other body with me.

As soon as I and the mystery person hit the water, it was like needles. The water was so cold that it took my breath away. The river was flooding and the current was so strong that I immediately felt myself getting pulled away. Then it was dark.

**

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**

When I woke up I noticed two things. For one, it was pitch black outside and it was still raining, but there was no more thunder. Secondly, I was alone. I mean, I couldn't hear anybody or even see anyone for that matter.

I stood up cautiously and looked around. I was apparently on the banks of some sort of river, most likely the one I fell into. I was seriously thankful that the rain wasn't cold, it was quite warm in fact, which was odd, because I'd never really been in rain that warm. I started to walk farther away from the river, trying to find a way out. And the only way was a very muddy hill.

"Mud…" I grumbled. I really hated mud after that horrible experience with the 'two foot deep' puddle. Stupid mud…

I walked onto the hill, clutching the soaking wet grass and pulling myself up inch by inch. I was almost up at the top when I didn't have a good grip with my right foot and I slipped.

"No!" I squeaked as I tipped backwards. I flailed my arms out trying to stop myself to no avail. As soon as I began my descent a hand grabbed around my wrist. I looked up, "Kouji?" ((A/N: There you have it Sydney!))

"You're such a klutz." he muttered as he helped pull me up the hill.

"Err… yeah… Where've you been?" I asked, noticing he was drenched.

"Well, after you _dragged_ me into the river, I climbed up a hill and started to walk around. That's when I saw something going up a hill and then when I got closer, you screamed and I grabbed you before you could break your neck." he replied.

"Sorry for pulling you in the river." I said sheepishly, smiling, "So, have you seen any of the others?" I asked.

"If I saw any of the others, don't you think they would be with me right now?" he asked sarcastically.

"Oh, yeah, right." I said with a sigh. Why am I so stupid? Sometimes I feel like Kouji really, really hates me.

"Come on, we'll get sick if we're in the rain like this." he said, waving for me to follow him. I nodded and followed his lead.

We walked in complete silence for a while. It seemed like Kouji wanted to say something, or like he was really upset. He was looking around for something non-stop. He seemed _scared_. Then, it hit me.

"Are you worried about Kouichi, Kouji?" I asked softly. He turned around and glared at me, his dark blue orbs burning into me. "Well, I know it's none of my business, but you seem nervous about something. And I just thought it was because of Kouichi, since we don't actually know where he is." I rambled nervously.

He sighed, "Yeah. I guess."

I nodded, "Want to talk about it?"

"No." he said a bit too quickly.

"Okay." I said. I really didn't want to force him to talk if he didn't want to. There was another long, but comfortable silence between us. It still rained, but it almost became a normal thing to us. The moon somehow kept shining on us, keeping our path illuminated. It was actually really nice.

"I guess… I guess that I just don't want to lose him again." Kouji said softly.

"Kouichi?" I asked.

"Yeah," he confirmed, "I couldn't believe that I had a brother, let alone a twin brother. So when we met, I felt as if I had to be with him at all times, and I felt like I had to protect him from anything that came our way. And now, I keep getting a horrible feeling that something bad's going to happen to him, and I won't be able to protect him from it."

There was another silence, "Because you really care about your brother. And you love him." I said.

He stiffened at the word 'love'. It was almost as if he had never really used that term for a long time. He was so lonely before, he probably never told his family he loved them. And that almost scares me.

"Y-yeah. I do love him." Kouji said softly.

"Of course you do, he's your brother. Your twin brother. You guys share a special bond that nobody will ever be able to break." I said, smiling.

He nodded sheepishly, "Yeah, you're right."

We began to walk again, the silence once again comfortable. The rain still fell, the moon still shone, but it was different. So very different.

"What're your brothers like?" Kouji asked.

Whoa. What's this? Kouji's initiating a conversation with me? Did he hit his head or what?

"Well, they're alright. There's Keiji, who's 17. He's really easygoing. And he's always been really calm and laidback. And Saburo, who's only two years older than I am. We're really close, because we're a lot alike. Except he's really hyper active and overly talkative. He reminds me of Takuya. We did tons of things together. Like this one time, we got annoyed at Keiji, because he kept slamming the doors. It was unintentional, but still it was really obnoxious. So we greased the floor with butter and we sat on the stairs and waited for him to come home from lacrosse practice. When he opened the front door and stepped inside he flew forward a few feet and then fell really hard. Saburo and I laughed really hard and he saw us, so he tried to chase us, but he couldn't because he kept falling all over the place." Kouji chuckled and shook his head. "My oldest brother's name is Naoki. He's 20. He's kind of… protective. And annoying. It was like he could never trust me, and it hurt… knowing he didn't trust me. Maybe it was because he loved me, but it was just so… unfair."

"Maybe that's why you have trust issues." Kouji said.

"What?" I asked.

"Well, you seem really hesitant to let people help you. And in the beginning you wouldn't talk much about your home life." he replied.

"Yeah… maybe you're right." I said softly.

It started to rain a bit harder and there was another crash of thunder.

"Fantastic." I groaned.

"Heh, not like it matters, we're already drenched." Kouji said with a shrug.

"Yeah. We're probably going to get so sick after this." I said, smiling.

Kouji looked like he was about to say something else, but he couldn't due to a huge explosion.

"What was that?" I yelled.

"Think it's the royal knights?" he asked.

"Only one way to find out." I said, pulling out my D-tector.

"Right." he said with a nod, pulling out his D-tector as well.

"Execute! Beast spirit evolution!" I yelled.

"Execute! Fusion evolution!" he yelled.

In unison we changed into Chikarimon and Beowulfmon. We both rushed over to the site of the explosion, only to see that our assumptions were true. Dynasmon and Crusadermon were destroying the forest, searching for the fractal code.

"Stop it!" Kouji yelled.

They turned around and Dynasmon laughed. "Did you hear that Crusadermon? They expect us to not do this anymore just because they want us to."

"Well isn't that just too bad." Crusadermon said, giggling.

"C'mon." Kouji growled.

"But it's only us two, how can we fight them?" I whispered.

"I'm sure the others heard the explosion, they'll be here soon, and they'll help us, I promise." he replied.

"O-okay." I said back.

"Frozen hunter!" Beowulfmon flew into Dynasmon, ramming him deeper into the forest. This ended up leaving me alone with Crusadermon.

"I don't recall seeing your beast spirit. You've actually improved from when I saw you as a human." Crusadermon said with a cackle.

"Really. If a spirit's better than a human, I would hate to have to see you as one." I snarled.

"Fist of Athena!" she yelled, flying straight towards me.

"Cherish beam smash!" I yelled, hitting her ineffectually. She still came charging for me. I jumped into the air as quickly as I could, dodging her by a hair. I felt pretty darn good at that point. Well, until she was suddenly behind me and she smashed me into the ground. I felt like I was hit by a billion buffalo with lead sneakers on, it was a shattering landing.

It wasn't five seconds later that Kouji, in his regular human form flew out from the trees.

"Kouji!" I yelled, I got out of the hole and flew into the air, grabbing his arm and catching him.

"DNA disintegrator!"

"Spiral Masquerade!"

I got hit by both attacks and it honestly felt like I was going to die right there and then, I crashed to the ground, landing under Kouji, who was still not moving or talking. I didn't know what was going on, but unconsciously, I felt the ground underneath me disappear, and I could feel myself falling, but that was all I could feel.

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"Keiko?" a familiar voice called. I shut my eyes a bit tighter, then opened them a crack. I saw blonde hair and green eyes. "Izumi." I said softly.

"Thank God! Are you alright?" she asked.

"Nnn… Yeah, where are we?" I asked softly.

"Well, we saw the explosion and we got there just in time to see the Royal Knights taking the fractal code away. So we grabbed you guys and we found a cave a few miles away." she explained.

"Is it still raining?" I asked.

She giggled, "No. It's not raining." she replied.

"Cool." I said, I tried to sit up, but I needed a bit of help from Izumi. I looked around and saw the others sitting there, Kouji was conscious. "You okay?" I asked him.

He nodded, "Yeah. You?" he asked.

"I'm fine, just tired." I replied.

"I'm sorry, Keiko. I shouldn't have made you fight them." Kouji said, frowning.

"Nah, it's fine. I got to insult Crusadermon, which I'm pretty stoked about." I said, grinning.

"I lied to you." he said suddenly.

"You lied to me?" I parroted.

"I told you the others would be there to help us, but they weren't." he groaned.

"Actually, they did help us. So you didn't lie." I said, raising an eyebrow.

"You're going to find a loop hole every time I apologize, aren't you?"

"Yeah. So you should just give up."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Fine."

"Fine."

And that's how I figured it out. If Kouji hated me, it was only a little bit.

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I love you Sydney. You are the superbad. Hehe. Well, read and review, or I'll hunt you down and drink all of the milk in the house. You may not think that's so bad, but seriously, it's really inconvienent to have no milk in the house. I would know.


	32. When it all Comes Crashing Down

Another chapter my friends. Hmm… I don't really know what to say, except sorry for the lateness. Do you guys realize that I only have a few more chapters until the sequel? It makes me joyous in my brain cells. Alright, here you go!

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon. Duh.**

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Kouichi POV:

Since the land was gone, we were simply floating around, looking for the Royal Knights. Takuya was evolved into BurningGreymon, holding myself and Kouji, Tomoki, Bokomon, Neemon and Patamon on my back, while Beetlemon had Izumi and Keiko on his back.

"I can't believe the land is almost all gone." Izumi said softly, looking around, her eyes looking softer and sadder than usual.

"One area left, right?" Keiko asked, her face gloomy.

"Just about." Beetlemon sighed with disappointment.

The sky was yellow-orange and it appeared to be setting. Small white clouds were suspended in the air, and the breeze we were receiving seemed to make them go by faster.

"Look." Kouji said suddenly, pointing ahead. I looked up and noticed a castle, surrounded by a meadow of orange, red and white flowers.

"Ophanimon's castle. Finally." I sighed, shifting a bit. Beetlemon and BurningGreymon landed in the meadow, a little ways away from the castle.

"I'm sure we can walk from here." Takuya stated, walking in the lead of the pack.

"Wait! I need to tie my shoe." Keiko called, getting on one knee to tie her shoe.

"Catch up to us, we want to see the castle!" Takuya called back as he jogged ahead with the others.

I stood where I was. "I'll wait for you, Keiko." I said.

Keiko looked up and smiled at me, her eyes lighting up. "Thanks, Kouichi!" she said happily. She was concentrating on tying her shoe, when I knew I needed to get something off my chest.

"Hey… Keiko?" I asked softly.

"Yeah?" she replied, still tying her shoe.

"Can… can I tell you something? If you promise not to tell anybody?" I asked, making sure the others weren't looking.

"Sure." she said.

"Well… Do you remember that time… the time when you and Kouji got hurt, because we were separated? Well, Kazemon and Kumamon and Beetlemon… they all left to get you two to safety… and Takuya was fighting Dynasmon and I was fighting Crusadermon… she… she said that I was different. Keiko, she said I _had _no physical form. She said that in the real world… I'm not real." I managed to get out.

Keiko's head slowly raised, her eyes wide and filled with shock and terror. But at the same time she looked sad. She looked like she was rally upset. "Do you think that she was trying to scare you, Kouichi?" she asked cautiously.

"I don't think so," I said softly. "Don't you think that that explains why I'm never hurt? And why I got to the Digital World differently than you all did?"

Keiko bit her lip and frowned. "Then what does it mean?" she asked softly.

I looked down, unable to answer. I shut my eyes and tried to think about what it really _did _mean. When everybody goes back to their families, and when they get to change from this experience, I won't. I won't even exist.

"Does Kouji know?" Keiko asked softly.

"No."

"Are you going to tell him?"

"I planned on telling him today. But… I don't want to be alone. Can you just… be there?" I asked.

"S-sure."

"Hey guys! Hurry up!" a voice called. We noticed a head peeking around from the castle doors.

Keiko and I made our way to the castle. The silence absolutely deafening. Once we finally got there, Takuya announced we were splitting into groups to find data in a book. Takuya and Izumi would be going together. Tomoki and Junpei. Then Keiko, Kouji and myself would be together.

We got to a big room with a huge staircase winding around the wall, which was filled with books. "How about you guys look up there, and I'll stay down here." she suggested.

"Sounds like a plan." Kouji said, the two of us going up the stairs.

For hours we searched, checking every book, looking in every nook and cranny. Yet, there was no data. My mind wasn't exactly on finding the data, though. I was wondering how I was going to tell Kouji what I was… or wasn't…

**Keiko POV:**

I watched as Kouji and Kouichi went up the stairs and I sighed. I had a ton of work to do.

Time went by slowly. I went through hundreds and hundreds of books, only to find nothing. I couldn't concentrate very well.

I felt really upset and scared. Kouichi wasn't real. When we went back to the real world, he wouldn't be with us, he would cease to exist. I was worried about the team. But most of all, I was worried about his mom and Kouji. Kouji would go back to the way he was before, except he would be depressed beyond belief. I couldn't even imagine what his mother would do.

Despite myself, I sniffled and felt a hot tear run down my face. I quickly rubbed it away from my fist. I can't cry. Kouichi's the one dealing with this, and I'm the one crying? I hate myself sometimes.

I took my mind off everything and picked up the next book. The title read 'Veenomon. Warrior of Love and Life.' "Well, shit." I muttered, opening the book and reading a few pages.

The talking above me stopped, and I got the feeling that Kouichi didn't exactly tell his brother what he was supposed to…

Awkward silence. "Hey guys!" I called up. I saw their heads peek over and look down. "Look! It's me!" I exclaimed, pointing to the cover of the book.

**Break**

I stared at the cover of the last book. My eyes hurt, my fingers were covered in paper cuts and I really wanted to get to sleep. I skimmed through the book only to find nothing. I sighed and threw the book off of the big stack of books I was sitting on.

"Find anything?" I looked up and saw Kouji and Kouichi walking over. They looked disappointed, and I figured they had no luck either.

"You went through all the books?" I asked.

Kouji nodded, "Every single one. And we found nothing at all."

I sighed and got off the books. "Should we go back to the others? Maybe they found something." I said, stretching my stiff muscles.

"Yeah, maybe they had some luck." Kouichi said, leading the pack out of the huge room.

When we got back, we found out that the others found nothing. They looked in every book, every space and everything, and just like us, nothing was found. That scared me more than anything.

"Children! The Royal Knights are coming!" Nephertimon cried. As soon as those words escaped her lips, a wall exploded and we sailed across the room and into a bunch of books.

"I was certain you would have ran away." Dynasmon said as he looked around the room.

"Your courage is certainly admirable, but very foolish. You remind me of this flower, your beauty is fragile." Crusadermon said, holding a white flower to her chest. She blew on the flower and the petals floated off, "Just as the petals scatter in the wind, so will you." she said.

"Oh yeah? Maybe it'll be us that does the scattering!" Takuya retorted, his face twisted in anger.

"Your arrogance bores me. Shall I call your bluff?" Dynasmon asked gruffly.

"From the darkness of this fallen world, a new order shall arise. Do you desire to go with it when it disappears?" Crusadermon asked.

"Well we desire you to disappear, you got that?" Takuya yelled.

"If only you children knew. The key is you, Nephertimon!" Dynasmon yelled, shooting a silver beam and Nephertimon and causing her to crash a few feet away from us.

"Destroy me. You must destroy me if I must really protect this castle." she gasped out, her energy depleting. "You must, it is my duty and my honor. For Lady Ophanimon."

"No! Let us protect this place!" Kouji yelled, pulling out his D-tector.

"And you need to protect yourself!" Takuya added, pulling his out as well.

In a flash, Takuya and Kouji were evolved into EmperorGreymon and MagnaGarurumon and they were up in the air, fighting the Royal Knights with a ferocity that sent shivers up my spine.

But they were really having a tough time. And all we could do was stand on the sidelines and watch. It was really frustrating, because time was running out, and we were completely defenseless. There was nothing we could do to stop the Royal Knights, and it was almost terrifying to know that this could be one of the last battles we would ever take part in.

Suddenly a huge blast of light came from the ground. Rocking the earth and smashing into MagnaGarurumon and EmperorGreymon, causing them to land in the castle and devolve.

"Nephertimon!" Izumi cried, her voice laced with panic. We all looked up to see Dynasmon holding onto her around her neck, squeezing.

"No! Let her go!" Tomoki wailed, stamping his foot on the ground.

"What made you think you could protect this world? You pathetic humans!" Dynasmon grunted, squeezing even harder around her neck and turning her into data. Crusadermon opened her palm and sucked in the data, laughing maniacally as she did. The ground was gone, and now we stood there in nothingness, the world around us completely taken away.

"It's gone… The whole world, completely gone!" Takuya gasped.

There was the distinct sound of glass breaking and then the words we hoped to never hear were spoken by Dynasmon:

"Lord Lucemon is finally free!"

We looked to our feet and saw a pale boy with delicate features. He had soft blonde hair and light blue eyes. He wore a white suit and he looked… innocent.

"Lucemon? That little boy?" Junpei asked incredulously.

"It was done as it was to be." Lucemon said in a scratchy voice, stepping forward. "I am your ordain ruler with absolute power over your very existence. You will serve me as you were born to do. You will give me my every desire." he turned and looked at us, smirking evilly, "Even yourself."

"Well that is not gonna happen, what do you think this world is? Your stupid toy or something?" he snarled.

"A toy? That's exactly what it is. I was bored with the old one. I think I'll create a new Digital World. A better one. My own!" he snarled, flying in front of Izumi.

"You little brat!" she shrieked.

"You don't care about anything but yourself!" I yelled.

"She's right! You're nothing more than a spoiled little boy!" Kouji bellowed, his eyes darkening with anger.

"Yeah! You big baby!" Tomoki sneered.

Lucemon scoffed and floated in another direction. "Heh. You're nothing but children yourselves." He turned back around and looked at us. "Hmph.. I don't want to play with you guys anymore. You're no fun. Goody goody cry babies! Begone!" his eyes widened and a pink beam was shot at us, flying at inhuman speeds and hitting us all at once.

We were launched throughout the air, pushed away from the Royal Knights and Lucemon. And once again, it felt as if all hope was lost.

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Thanks readers! I love you all! Please review, it would make my day.


	33. Let's Go Together

Yeah, I'm late once again. I'm sorry, but I've been really busy with some stuff lately. And I didn't reply to your reviews, I know. My computer's been slow, and it'd take forever, so I'll write the replies right here. Oh and on the off chance that I did reply to your review, you get two! Yay!

Celestial Writer: I know! I hate Lucemon *kicks Lucemon* That's actually a really good question. I'm glad you said something about that, because it will be relevant in the sequel. Thanks so much for your review!

Yuki's Little Girl: So many mysteries to be solved! What to do? Well, I could always update, so here you go!

DigiLoveReader: I know! I'm so stoked to be finished! I'm so glad you're excited for the next stories! It makes me happy! Well, thanks for the review, and here's the next chapter!

SydneyBell24: SYDNEY!!! I know, I felt bad for Kouichi. It's also super sad that Kouji doesn't know. This may be cause for some celery and SunnyD, right? And you liked Keiko in this? AWW!!! Thanks so much smiles! I'm glad you love it! Here's the next chapter (Oh my god. I had to rewrite next like, 20 times, because I kept writing nexy. Garr. Sounds like Zexy. ;D) double chin.

ALL of GirlsLikeeBoys' reviews: Thanks pumpkin pie with a dollop of whipped cream on top. XD I'm so glad you're liking it! You make me smile!

**Disclaimer: In case you didn't realize it in the other 32 chapters, I don't own Digimon. I simply own Keiko. Yeah, shocking, right?**

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Keiko POV:

"The third moon that orbit's the Digital World is usually covered in yellow sand, giving it a warm, golden appearance." Bokomon read from the book, looking up and observing the atmosphere.

We ended up landing on a moon, far away from the Digital World, or what was left of it, anyways. Now, we stood here. Lost, tired and disappointed. Lucemon was here, he was back, and nothing would be stopping him any time soon. Kouichi wasn't even existent, he was just a spirit floating around, and when we got back to the real world, he wouldn't be with us. It felt like it was truly… over.

"Yeah, this place is a Bella Luna." Izumi sighed, her eyes half lidded with relaxation.

Junpei took in a deep breath, sighing happily. "Ditto me on that, Izumi. It's kind of like a slice of heaven." Junpei added, smiling.

"Shut up, Junpei." Kouji snarled. "We're not anywhere near heaven just yet." His voice was really scary. He sounded angrier than ever, like he was ready to punch him in the face.

"I just meant to say that it was nice." Junpei said softly, looking at his feet. The silence took over once again, and the only sounds were the uncomfortable shifting of all of us. Kouji scared us all.

"The Digi-world's had it." Tomoki piped up. We all turned and all there was left was a dark mass. It was gray and black swirling colors, looking ominous. "It's in really bad shape."

"It got wiped out." Junpei sighed.

"Guess it's really over." Izumi added, her green eyes shaking with tears.

"No it's not!" Takuya suddenly yelled.

"How can you say that, Takuya?" Tomoki inquired.

"Because I know better. There just has to be a way for us to turn the whole world around. We can't give up. Winners never quit, and if we quit, we'll never win!" Takuya declared.

"But, Takuya, the world we did our best doesn't even exist." Junpei sighed.

"It's not that we're quitting, it's just that we have nothing else we can do here and no way left to do it." Izumi added.

"Hello, have you guys forgotten that we're all Digimon?" Kouji snapped, holding up his D-tector.

"Yeah! That's the spirit!" Takuya exclaimed.

Junpei smiled, Izumi giggled and Tomoki looked up at Takuya with admiration, whispering his approval.

Takuya looked over at Kouichi, "Right Kouichi?" he asked enthusiastically. Kouichi didn't say anything, he just looked down at his feet, his eyes giving off immense sadness.

Takuya looked over at me, "Keiko?" he asked, still as excited as before.

"Yeah." I said.

Bokomon let out a sad sigh and the others followed, all of us in gloomy moods all over again.

"Come on!" Takuya yelled, stomping the ground with his foot.

Once again, an unbearable silence broke out. The volume of Takuya's voice got us all to shut up in a hurry. It was scary to see all of us like this. It was like we all just gave up… but I guess we all _did _give up.

Kouji sighed and began to walk away, Takuya walking with him. The rest of us just watched them go, unable to move from our spots. Junpei sighed and moved ahead, Tomoki following shortly after. Kouichi began to move as well, Bokomon, Neemon and Patamon next to him. Izumi was about to move too, but I spoke up first:

"It's all gone, isn't it?"

Izumi stared down, looking at her shoes. "Yeah, it is."

"Do you think that it'll be okay in the end?" I asked, looking at the black mass of smoke.

"The good guys always win." Izumi said simply, not making eye contact with me.

"Okay." I said and began to walk with her to the others.

We walked across the moon in silence. Even Takuya, who couldn't stop talking, didn't make a sound. He stared ahead, Kouji next to him. He was mad at us. I think he was trying to convey that. But in all honesty, I think he was mad at himself, too.

"What are those floating things?" Izumi asked suddenly, pointing ahead. Pink bubbles were floating around in the air, over the horizon. We couldn't see what was causing them.

"Looks like somebody's taking a bubble bath!" Neemon squealed.

"Oh, goody! Bath time!" Patamon chirped, flying over to the source of the bubbles.

Bokomon began to flail his arms in panic, "No! Patamon! Papamom says come back!" he cried, running over to him.

We all ran behind him, following him into a field of breathtakingly beautiful flowers. "Wow! Check it out!" Takuya exclaimed. There were baby Digimon all over the ground, egg shells littering the area around them.

"BABIES!!!" Izumi squealed, grabbing my arm and dragging me over with her. "Lookit them! Look! Look! They're so cute!" she exclaimed.

Okay, sure I was in a bad mood. But these babies were just so damn cute. It almost hurt. "Wow!" I exclaimed. One was thrust into my arms.

"Look, Keiko! He likes you!" Izumi said.

I looked down at it and smiled. It was a purple blob with two little antennas sticking out of it's head. "Hello." it said softly.

I was having good luck with the little guy. I really liked little kids, so how Digimon were different was a mystery to me. Junpei's had taken a liking to being lifted up in the air. Izumi was petting her small pink bird while Tomoki was cuddling his lovingly. Takuya's was running all over the place, but luckily he had enough energy to chase it.

Kouji and Kouichi weren't so lucky, though. Kouji's was sobbing, screaming and squirming out of his hand, crying hysterically.

"I sure have a way with kids." he muttered, a scowl on his face.

Kouichi's was crying as well, shaking all over the place in it's little gooey way. "Maybe he's hungry, or maybe he needs to-" he didn't have time to finish, due to the… erm… spray that hit him in the face. It was really not okay.

Suddenly Patamon was running around with two other Digimon, although they weren't babies. They were rookie levels, just like Patamon himself. There was a brown one with long ears and a white one that looked like a puppy.

"Lopmon, Patamon and Salamon. The rookie forms of Cherubimon, Ophanimon and Seraphimon, all finally together again, Time has destined for them to be with each other." Bokomon sighed, smiling dreamily.

"After everything they went through, they've forgiven each other." Takuya said softly.

"Gee, I guess when they were reborn it purified them." Izumi said.

"I don't know, Izumi. Maybe they became pure and that's why they were reborn." Junpei replied, looking over at Izumi.

"What do you guys think?" Izumi asked.

"Who knows?" Tomoki replied with his usual laid back demeanor.

"I don't really think it matters how this happened, just as long as they grow up together as friends." Kouji said, looking at Kouichi, who nodded at him.

"Just like us." I muttered more to myself, looking down at the purple blob in my arms. Maybe… just maybe we would all get through this, Kouichi too. We could, right?

"We have to make sure that happens." Takuya declared. We all looked up to the mass of darkness in the sky, watching it shift uneasily.

"What can we do to bring it all back?" Junpei questioned.

"Just try." Izumi replied simply.

"Yeah, we can't give up hope." Kouichi added.

"We need a new plan of action." Tomoki stated.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"Right." Kouji replied.

"We'll make it happen." Takuya said, looking up with a smile. The moment was perfect. We were all on the same wavelength. We knew exactly what needed to be done, and at that moment, all of our troubles were gone, and all that mattered was each other.

Nothing lasts forever, as the Digimon jumped from our arms, crying and yelping as they ran away. "They're here." Patamon said, anger evident in his small voice.

"What'll you do?" Salamon asked softly.

"What?" Takuya asked.

"Will you fight or will you flee?" Lopmon asked. We could see the Royal Knights flying towards, their armor shining, they were ready to fight.

Ophanimon's voice rang out. "The game to determine your future has begun." the memorable voice boomed.

"Yeah, boy have I been in the game." Takuya said. "It became a more serious game when I found out who I really was. Finding out your not just a kid, but a Digimon gave me all kinds of feelings. Feelings of power and responsibility, but most of all if gave me the feeling that what I did really could affect things. At first it was kind of fun, it was really exciting to be exploring the Digital World, discovering the Forest Terminal; it was like a big puzzle, trying to decide which way to go. But as we made our way through the dark continent, and to the Rose Morning Star, we experienced more challenges. As I look back on our quest, I realize we have shared so many adventures; many of my memories are bittersweet, and some are downright painful. Seeing so many creatures that were getting destroyed changed the way I think about evil. Evil can confuse you when you're staring it in the face. You'd hope the face of evil could change itself, but it won't unless you force it to change. As much as evil has tried to get the best of us, we have never stopped trying. Many times we've had chances to leave the Digital World, we could've gone back to our safe warm homes and our loving families, but we always chose to stay. To try to change things, because evil in all it's forms must be stopped. We've always tried to stop evil from running wild. I've faced this decision before, but I always return to fight for what's right. And as we watched our friends go back to Earth, there was a part of us that wished we were going with them. But there's a reason we're still here. We can make a difference. After all the things we've seen and all that we've been through, we're not about to let evil have the final victory."

"They may think we don't have anything left, but we're not finished yet!" Kouji added.

"You're right! When we combine all of our strength, we can't be beat!" Takuya exclaimed.

As the Royal Knights walked over to us, we just watched, all feeling the adrenaline pumping, all of us ready.

"So how 'bout it guys?" I said to Izumi, Junpei, Tomoki and Kouichi. "How about we give these guys a shot at this?"

"Right! You can do it you guys!" Izumi cheered, tears rolling down her face.

And as we raised our D-tectors in the air, I couldn't help but feel like this was the end of the worst.

* * *

The smoke cleared and I coughed violently, trying to clear my lungs of the black smog. "Keiko!" a voice yelled.

I grabbed a hand, not really knowing who it was, it was just so dark. "Are you okay?" I cried.

"Where are the others?" I recognized it as Izumi's voice.

The Royal Knights and Takuya and Kouji all collided in the sky in one big burst. That's about all we could see, because the explosion was blinding and sent us all different ways.

Another burst of wind and a cackle sent us falling over and rolling along the sand.

"Guys! Where are you!" a voice yelled. I think it was EmporerGreymon's voice.

"Over here!" I cried, holding onto Izumi's hand for dear life. A scream and another explosion caused the Earth to crack and I let go of Izumi's hand.

"Keiko!" Izumi cried, reaching out and trying to grab me. There were endless explosions and finally the smoke cleared.I found myself to be several feet higher up than Izumi, elevated on land, I was a few feet lower than Tomoki and Junpei. Below us we could see Lucemon. But not the child. This one was grown and it was scanning the data of Crusadermon and Dynasmon.

"You monster!" Takuya, who was in human form, screamed in rage. Lucemon kicked him in the side, sending him into some rocks and hitting his head. Takuya was out cold.

Kouji's eyes widened and he sprinted over to Lucemon, sending a fist into his side. Lucemon grinned madly and grabbed Kouji around the neck, holding him up in the air, choking him mercilessly.

"Stop it!" Kouichi screamed.

Lucemon looked up at Kouichi and then at Kouji, who was struggling less and less. "Oh, you can have him. I'd prefer some ice anyway." he said cruelly. He threw Kouji up to Kouichi, knocking the twins into each other and off the rock.

Lucemon flew up to Tomoki and Junpei's rock, grabbing Tomoki's wrist and holding it tightly.

"Knock it off!" Junpei screamed, clawing at Lucemon's wrist.

"Child's play." Lucemon growled before dropping Tomoki off of the land and to the ground.

"Tomoki!" Junpei yelled, trying to grab Tomoki before he fell and only falling himself.

He was going to take us down one by one. Each of us. Each and every one of us. Lucemon was now looking for Izumi and myself.

"Izumi!" I cried. She looked up just in time to be punched across the face and thrown to the ground in unconsciousness.

Lucemon floated up to me and I never felt so alone in my life. He kicked the rock and sent it tumbling to the ground, which was over 20 feet away.

"Cakewalk." I heard him mutter in boredom as I hit the ground, still conscious enough to hear the explosion from the core of the moon.

* * *

Yep. I went there. Hah see you all around! Happy reading! And if you don't **review**, I will spray you with whipped cream. Thanks.


	34. And As We Go On

It's so much easier to reply to reviews in chapters. I may do this FO EVAHHH!!!

**CelestialWriter: Thanks so much! I really appreciate the review! Here's the next chapter!**

**My-little-star: Ooh! I like the new name! It's really cool! And the pie incident? Haha, Bad feeling. Thanks so much for the review!**

**Yuki's Little Girl: So many questions to be answered, ne? We'll just have to decode it now! Thanks for the review!**

**Sydneybell24: You gross man. XD And thanks for that compliment, Syd. :D And you cocky little shit. I luff yah. Fanks for the review!**

**PurpleViolin: I must say, I absolutely adore your name! Thanks so much for reading! And I'm really excited for the sequel too, so I'll try to finish this one quickly and get right to the sequel. And you mean Tamotsu? Oh yeah, he'll be a _love _factor in the sequel. DUN DUN DUN!!! And here we have another Koujeiko fan! Thanks so much for the review!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon, But I do own Keiko and all of her... stuff...**

* * *

"Izumi?" I whimpered as I crawled from the rubble. The sand was yellow, and I was covered by it. "Takuya?" I said softly again as I saw the light. "Kouji! Kouichi!" I called excitedly. "Tomoki! Junpei!" I yelled as I lifted myself out of the hole I was currently residing in. It was cooler out, but not too cool. Just neutral, I guess. "Everyone okay?" Kouichi asked.

"I guess so." Izumi said, pulling herself out as well. She looked around than her face contorted. "Where's Takuya?!?" she yelled, standing up.

"And… and Kouji!" Kouichi yelled, looking around frantically.

"How tragic. Lucemon must have scanned every egg on the moon!" Bokomon cried.

"Well I don't see an egg big enough for Takky or Kouji." Junpei said softly.

"Look! What's that?" Tomoki cried, pointing to the side. We looked and saw Kouji and Takuya floating in a diamond like force field. Lopmon, Patamon and Salamon were all flying on the sides of it, controlling the directions it went.

"Takuya!" Izumi exclaimed happily.

"Kouji!" Kouichi cried soon after.

"Man, am I glad to see you guys!" Takuya exclaimed as he jumped out along with Kouji.

"Not nearly as glad as we are to see you!" Junpei said with a sigh of relief.

"I gotta tell ya. It was a little touch and go there for a while. Then Patamon and his buddies helped us out." Takuya said, smiling at Patamon and the others.

"Wow, you guys took on Lucemon all by yourselves?" I asked.

"You're pretty strong for such little guys." Tomoki stated.

"Just like you Tomoki." Izumi said.

"Well, let's not forget who they used to be." Junpei replied, patting Salamon on the head.

"Well you can bet Lucemon hasn't. He'll definitely be ready for them next time. And us." Takuya said, scowling at the ground.

Silence overtook the meteor we sat on and soon enough we divided ourselves up a bit. Kouji wandered to the edge and sat down, Kouichi taking a deep breath and following him soon after. Izumi and I sat down together and the other Digimon were all goofing off elsewhere, while Takuya, Junpei and Tomoki talked in hushed voices to the side.

"He's so cute." Izumi said softly, staring off into space.

"Who? Kouji?" I asked. Izumi smiled and shook her head. "Kouichi?" Izumi smiled wider and her face got slightly pink as she shook her head once again. "Um… Junpei?" Izumi narrowed her eyes at me for a moment. "Ohhh… I get it now." I said with a smirk.

"I like him… He's just so cool and funny and sweet." Izumi cooed, watching Takuya intently. "When we were at the library, he said he was glad to have met me and that he liked me."

"Wow! That's great, Zumi!" I exclaimed happily, grinning at her.

"Do you have a special someone at home?" she asked, winking at me.

"I really like someone who I've known for a while." I said, staring down at the sand as Izumi and I played tic tac toe.

"Tell me about him." Izumi said.

"His name is Tamotsu… and he's our age. We went to elementary school together. He plays soccer and he's really cool. Oh, and he's smoking hot." I added, causing Izumi to laugh.

"What's he look like?" she asked.

"Blonde, but not as bright as your hair. His is a like a sandy blonde, and he wears it all sexy and it looks like he doesn't care, but at the same time it's perfect. He has green eyes. They're not light green, but a dark green. It's really pretty. And he has the most amazing body. He's not like, huge and ridiculously muscular. He's just perfect and tall, like he works out enough to make an obvious difference. He's too perfect for words." I said with a giggle as I thrust myself backwards and into the sand.

"Jeez, does he have any friends?" Izumi replied with a giggle.

I grinned at her. "I thought your heart belonged to _Takuuuya_!" I squealed.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean that I can't have fun before we actually get together!" she said in defense.

"Good point." I said, sitting back up. A loud roaring noise suddenly came out of nowhere. "Holy crap! What is that?" I cried.

We stood up and ran to the edge of the rock; fractal code was shooting out from the black mass of what used to be the Digital World.

"I'm guessing that's not good news." Junpei said shakily.

"It's the dark area!" Bokomon cried.

"I was right! It's not good news!" Junpei wailed.

"Guys, I'm guessing that's where Lucemon is hiding out." Takuya said, staring intently ahead.

"How do we get there?" Tomoki asked.

"Patamon, will you and your buddies take us there? We need to get to the dark area ASAP." Takuya asked. The three nodded and we looked forwards again.

The rock slowly began to move as Kouichi and Kouji made their way over. We were slowly picking up speed and were getting closer and closer to the Digital World. Another longer strand of fractal code shot out and began to form a picture.

Shibuya.

Right in front of us was a picture of our home. People were walking down the streets and buildings shone in the sun. Wait, if it was showing a picture of Shibuya, then that meant-

"He's going for Shibuya! He's going for our homes!" Takuya cried.

"Bokomon, what does it say about Digimon entering the real world in your book?" Kouji asked, his cool demeanor a polar opposite to Takuya's panic.

"It says here… that if Digimon enter the real world, they will wreak havoc… and eventually… e-eventually…" Bokomon looked down at his feet. "Destroy it."

"No! No! No, we have to stop him!" Takuya yelled.

"But how?" Izumi asked.

"I know we'll find a way." Kouichi said, glaring at the picture. "We have to… I don't think we'd all be here if there wasn't something we could do about it."

"If we don't stop him now, Lucemon is going to make our world look just like that." Takuya said, pointing to the black mass.

"We already know that long ago the ten legendary warriors found a way to defeat Lucemon and seal him away. There must be a way for you seven to do it again! I just know there is!" Bokomon said.

"Then we'll find it." Takuya said, he took out his D-tector and the rest of us followed suit, transforming into out respective Digimon. Kouichi, Izumi, Junpei, Tomoki and I all changed into our beast spirits while Kouji and Takuya fusion evolved.

"Follow my lead!" Aldhamon yelled as he flew towards the dark mass.

We all shadowed him, flying straight for the core. The inside was disturbing to say the least. It was a dark maroon-purple color with strange designs on the inside.

Lucemon smiled at us. "How very tedious of you all. Why are you still alive?" He shrugged. "Ah well, it might be nice to have an audience for my next performance. So… you guys aren't really going to try to stop me, are you? Oh, how very amusing." he mused.

"Do you see us laughing?" Aldhamon snarled.

"We will stop you." Beowulfmon growled.

"Oh, very well if you insist. My entrance into your world will be even more impressive if I use each of you as my stepping stones." Lucemon said with a sense of boredom laced in his voice.

"Blizzard blaster!"

"Hurricane wave!"

The attacks were simply brushed by with the swipe of Lucemon's hand. He flew over to them and smacked them with a gloved hand. They smashed into one of the walls, sliding down the side.

"Thunder fist!"

"Affection ring!"

"Atomic inferno!"

Lucemon sent the attacks back into us, causing us to be hit by our own powers. We were all sent reeling into the wall behind us.

"Shadow meteor!"

"Cleansing light!"

Lucemon simply dodged Lowemon's attack then headed straight towards Beowulfmon. He put his hand in front of his hand missile and sent Beowulfmon through the air, his arm smoking. Lucemon followed him and was about to attack him again. Lowemon came at him from above, but he was hit by an attack and sent into the ceiling.

"Kouichi!" Izumi cried.

"Although your pathetic attempts amuse me, they will never defeat me. Should I show you the reason why?" he asked. He raised both of his arms out to his sides. A silver orb appeared in one hand. "Behold, the power of light." A black orb appeared in the other. "And the power of darkness."

He dropped the silver orb down and it surrounded us, sending shocks through our bodies. The black orb came down as well, because suddenly we were engulfed in a world of pain.

It felt like we were stuck in there for years. It burned like hell and I almost would have preferred to die rather than deal with the pain. We were all screaming in pain, begging him to stop, begging for mercy.

It surprised us when he did. The orb was gone, but the pain was still there. I could barely open my eyes. I could feel that I wasn't Veenomon anymore, and I could bet that the others were unable to retain their forms.

"Light and dark are opposites, but when together in the same place and at the same time, it makes something beautiful." Lucemon said. "I think this calls for another demonstration, don't you? But it's too bad… you won't survive the experience." he said. "I call light!"

I felt overwhelming pain once again as the light orb smashed into us, shocking up with it's strength. "And darkness!"

We waited, but the _real _pain never came. I opened my eyes a bit and I almost threw up. We were no longer in the light, nor the darkness. None of us were. Only Lowemon was.

He was going to die.

"I know now why I came to the Digital World." he said, somehow smiling through the tears running down his armor. I wasn't meant to be Cherubimon's pawn. I was his greatest gift. Lucemon, you aren't the only one who can bring light and darkness together!"

Lowemon turned a shaky head towards us. "I'm glad I met all of you. Thank you for being my friends." he said.

Then I knew what was coming next. It wasn't like when we got back, he would be there waiting for us. He wouldn't be there at all. He would be gone. Forever.

"I wish I could see you back in the real world. But I'm afraid I won't be able to." he said.

"Kouichi?" Kouji whimpered.

"Protect our world… that's all I ask." Lowemon said.

"Kouichi…" Kouji said in a choked voice.

"I… I think… I'm ready." he said.

The orb exploded and Kouichi floated there, looking like an angel, wrapped up in light. He looked over and smiled, floating down. "It's up to you now Kouji, take the spirits of darkness." the two spirits floated over to Kouji, going into his chest.

"Little brother. I can't tell you how much it means to me that we've met. I have no regrets. No regrets." Kouichi said before his body sparkled away, drifting to Lucemon and going into his hand.

"No!!!" Kouji cried. Tearless sobs wracking his body. "Kouichi! Please!" He suddenly began to grip his chest, crying out in pain. "H-Hurts! I-It hurts!!!" he screamed.

"Lucemon…" Takuya snarled.

"Kouichi… A-Ah!!!" Kouji screamed, holding his chest as darkness and light seeped onto his fingers.

Takuya grabbed onto Kouji. "Kouji? Kouji!" he cried, holding the screaming boy to his chest as he writhed in his arms.

"Son of a **bitch**!" Takuya screamed as fire engulfed them, darkness and light flinging out from the sides.

We heard Kouji scream hysterically while Takuya screamed in fury. The fire exploded, and light and darkness wrapped around it.

"Ancient Spirits Unite!!!"


	35. It'll Never End

**Empyrea: Thanks so much for the review! I'm glad you liked it. I bet I'm looking forward to the sequel just as much as you are! :D**

**PurpleViolin: Yes, your name is absolutely epic. XD And I hate that they killed Kouichi, too! And I used to hate hate hate Takumi, but now I'm getting really into it! Maybe it'll be in the sequel? :o I'm so glad you like the story, and thanks so much for the review.**

**Celestial Writer: Thanks for the review! And yes, this is the final chapter of Digimon Frontier Refreshed. But will they do something different?? We'll just have to see!**

**Yuki's Little Girl: Thanks for taking the time to review! So many questions, but lets hope they'll all be answered in this next chapter!**

**DigiLoveReader: Thanks so much for the review! And yes, this is the last chapter. Sob, sob. I'm glad you liked the girl talk, I like the friendship between Izumi and Keiko, so I thought that'd be a cute additive.**

**My-little-star: Thanks for the review! I wanted to take down the creators of Digimon for killing Kouichi. Ahah, the pie incident surely sounds fantastic. I wish our school could get into a pie fight. Haha.**

**Sydneybell24: Thanks for the review, Syd. No bitch, this is totally the last chapter. Yes, yes, Keiko and Tamotsu will have some connections in the future if you know what I'm saying home skillet biscuit. And you'll never stop rooting for Koujeiko, will you? XD Yeah, you're just being the cocky shit head that you tend to be on occasion. Nahh, you're the best. And I have another pet name? Haha, you hoe. Here's the next chaptarr.**

**Keiko POV:**

Takuya and Kouji were engulfed in a ball of light and we all stared in awe. We could hear sounds coming from them and Lucemon, although we couldn't see very well. They were obviously engaged in a battle.

"What do we do?" I yelled over the sounds.

"I don't know!" Izumi cried.

"What can we do? We can't spirit evolve, we'll just get in the way!" Junpei said.

Lucemon flew out of the ball of light and smashed into the wall. Soon enough some sort of large Digimon followed as well. It was this weird silver and red thing, with black streaks going down it's sides. It looked like a mixture between, Agunimon, Lobomon and Lowemon. It looked kind of scary actually.

It beat Lucemon into a wall and flew backwards, sucking up it's fractal code.

It's egg went up into the air and the red ball surrounding us disintegrated. They turned back into humans, and were floating in front of, Takuya looking ecstatic, while Kouji… looked anything but…

"That was… fast." Tomoki said.

"Yeah, I thought it would be a lot tougher than that." Takuya replied.

"Well, you do have the power of darkness as well." Junpei pointed out. Kouji suddenly glared at him as soon as he brought up darkness. Poor Kouji… "Sorry, Kouji." Junpei said softly.

Kouji looked back down as light filtered into the area we were floating in. None of us knew what to say, Kouji just lost the only person he cared about. And now, what would happen to him?

The light started to go away, and in the sky was a hole. It was big and black and it didn't look… right.

"Shouldn't the Digital World be coming back?" I asked softly.

"Yeah, it should be reappearing by now. Right?" Izumi sounded horrified.

"Holy. Shit." Takuya said. He pointed up to the sky and a large purple dragon with a big black orb resting in it's hands was sitting there. It was at least 60 feet tall, and it snarled at us right off the bat.

It flew off to the side, flying through the hole quickly. "Where does that lead?" Tomoki cried.

"I don't know!" Bokomon seemed to be panicking. Neemon was far worse off, though.

"You don't _know?!? _But Bokomon! **You'resupposedtoknoweverythingandyouhavethebookandyou'realwaysthesmart-"**

"Neemon, calm down!" Kouji yelled, glaring at the small yellow Digimon. He looked at us. "We have to follow him." he said, his voice on the edge of desperation. "For Kouichi."

We all nodded and evolved.

"Aldhamon!"

"Beowulfmon!"

"Veenomon!"

"Beetlemon!"

"Kazemon!"

"Kumamon!"

"Let's go!" Aldhamon yelled.

We all flew towards the dragon that was obviously a different form of Lucemon. He was speeding through the sky; shards of the atmosphere were coming at us.

"He's faster than I thought!" Aldhamon yelled over the roar of the atmospheric shattering. "But if he thinks we're gonna let him make trouble, in the human world, than he's wrong! We're not gonna let some overgrown evil lizard take over the earth and run our lives! No way! I've got to protect my family and stop this creep!"

"I can't let it stop me from keeping my promise!" Beowulfmon cried. "I gave my word to Kouichi that I would visit our mom, and bring her flowers, and let her know how important she is to each of us! She deserves all my respect."

"I know now that I can trust my friends and family!" I spoke up as well. "I've realized that being afraid of getting close to people will get me nowhere! I want to care and I want to be cared about! I like who I am, and I won't let Lucemon stop me from finally being able to change who I am!"

"I'm doing this for my friends!" Beetlemon said. "Thanks to this adventure, I know what friendship really means. It's not about chocolate or magic tricks, it's about caring! I'm not afraid of protecting you all! That's what real friends do!"

"I know who I am, now." Kazemon said. "And I'm going to surround myself with new friends. That lonely girl who couldn't open up to anyone doesn't exist anymore! I'm a new person and I want to help everyone!"

"I've learned not to be a crybaby or a coward!" Kumamon added. "My big brother always tried to protect me, but now he doesn't have to! I can't wait to show him how much I've changed! We've gotta win… so we can all go home."

"We have to work as a team!" Aldhamon said. "We're all totally committed to do whatever it takes to stop Lucemon!"

"As humans…" Tomoki began.

"And as Digimon." Izumi finished.

"We're here to protect…" Junpei started.

"All of the Digital World." I supplied.

"And the human world as well!" Kouji said.

"No matter what it takes!" Takuya yelled.

Lucemon flew through the hole, making his way into the human world. We followed and flew up through it as well. Looking around, we realized it was the station in which we all got on the trains and came to the Digital World. The only thing, though, was that it was in ruins.

"Look up there!" Kumamon shouted.

We all looked up above us and saw a large hole in the ceiling, the walls were purple and glowing in a strange manner. "Let's move!" Aldhamon yelled.

We flew up to the hole and spotted Lucemon flying forwards at great speeds. He was heading for the human world.

"Atomic inferno!"

"Cleansing light!"

The attacks were perfectly on the dot, but where he was marred immediately grew back to normal. Aldhamon and Beowulfmon fell slightly behind us.

"Let's attack as one!" I yelled to the other three. "All on my arrow!" I looked around and they nodded in agreement. "Love shot!" I held the arrow in place, still flying forward but pulling back as far as I could. "Aldhamon, Beowulfmon, this attack is going to send me back, please catch me!" The other two nodded and prepared themselves.

"Hurricane gale!"

"Blizzard blaster!"

"Lightning blitz!"

All the attacks were absorbed by the silver arrow and it became supercharged. I let it snap out of my hand and I flew backwards from the recoil of the attack.

"Gotcha!" I felt two pairs of hands on my back, pushing me back into place. The three of us flew forward and caught up to the others to watch the arrow take it's hit on Lucemon.

It hit and sent out a huge explosion. "He's toast!" Aldhamon cried with joy. The area where his skin was melted began to repair again, completely recovering to the way it was before.

"Tide of despair!"

A pink-red laser hit us and sent us plummeting backwards through the tunnel. We all fell right back into the station, devolving immediately. The fractal code was surrounding our waists; we really got pummeled.

We all slowly made our way to our feet. Takuya was the only one who got back up quickly. He pulled out his D-tector, ready to transform again, but Kouji grabbed his wrist.

"Takuya, wait." he said.

"Why?" Takuya snapped.

"Don't you remember? Lucemon's invulnerable." Kouji said calmly in comparison to Takuya's frantic voice.

"How could I forget… But… we can't just do nothing." His voice became softer, less determined and more tired.

"We can't go charging in like this either, we'll be destroyed for sure." Kouji said.

"So what… should we do?" Takuya asked, his eyes looking completely and utterly lost. Kouji looked down at his feet, not replying to Takuya. "Oh… oh god… we're done… it's all done!"

Kouji let go of Takuya's wrist and Takuya stumbled away, dazedly. He leaned against some rubble, his hands planted against it and his head pushing on it. "There's nothing we can do to stop Lucemon!" he cried.

Takuya slammed his fist on the debris. "Ugh! I can't even move this stupid elevator!" he yelled, pushing against it. "I mean, who were we kidding? Trying to save the Digital World! What a joke! We got beaten every step of the way and now the same thing happens when we try to save the real world… It's not fair!" he wailed, breaking down into sobs. "The whole world is going to be destroyed!"

Kouji glared down at the floor, clenching his fist. Tomoki let out a small sniffle, but didn't cry. Junpei stared at a wall on the other side of the room, while Izumi held Patamon to her chest. I looked down at my feet.

Maybe Takuya is right. Maybe it's al over. Maybe it was all just a lost cause from the beginning, a joke. If we're supposed to be the good guys, why can't we just win already?

"Not true. You guys did everything you could. It just wasn't meant to be, I suppose. You can't blame yourselves." Bokomon said softly, and for once Neemon didn't say something stupid and Takuya didn't perk up and Kouji didn't say he was wrong. Junpei didn't stomp his foot and yell "Enough!" Izumi didn't say that we're Digimon and that we could win, and Tomoki didn't say that we had to beat the big, bad bully. I didn't try to make a point about anything and Kouichi, if he were even here, didn't say that we were a family, and families don't give up, families don't break apart, they listen and fight until the end. Takuya just kept breaking down.

"Well I can blame myself and I will! I failed everyone! It's our fault…" Takuya whispered the last bit, finally sobbing harshly.

_I never thought you guys would quit on me._

Kouichi's voice? We all jumped and looked around.

"Kouichi?" Kouji said softly.

_That's right, it's me. Why are you guys quitting already? Are you that scared?_

Takuya looked down for a moment, sniffling and looking up. "No…" he whispered.

_Exactly, if I were there, I would kick you all into gear. But, I'm not, now am I? Look, you all made a promise to fight, to win. I know you're all stronger than that, you're better. You can win. You just have to believe in yourselves. Have faith._

Our D-tectors began to glow, showing our signs, then showing a different one. Mine showed my sign, then it showed Izumi's.

_You all need to pair up and merge, and you can win. You need to have strength, you need to fight, you need to do this. Not only for yourselves, but your loved ones. Takuya, do it for Shinya and your parents. Keiko, do it for your brothers and your mom and dad. Izumi and Junpei, think about all of your friends. Tomoki, prove yourself to your brother. And Kouji…_

_Do it for mom._

Kouji smiled softly up to the ceiling. "I will." he said softly.

_I know. Now, do this. And don't even think about giving up._

Takuya and Kouji raised their D-tectors. "Darkness, light, fire, unite!" In a flash, they merged into each other, forming the same creature we had seen earlier. The same one that took down Lucemon. "Lunardramon!"

Junpei and Tomoki raised theirs as well. "Ice! Thunder! Unite!" Light surrounded them and they merged into a large green furry animal. It had a body like Korikkakumon's, although it was lightning colored and it's axes were blue and glowing with lightning. "Thundramon!"

Izumi and I looked at each other and smiled, raising our D-tectors to the ceiling. "Wind and love! Unite!"

I felt the familiar warmth surround me and before my eyes, I could see what we had become. It was beautiful. A woman-like Digimon with long blonde hair. It wore a gold bikini top with diamonds encrusted in it; a white roman skirt that was adorned with a gold belt. Gladiator sandals up to her knees, just like Veenomon had. On it's back sat a gold bag filled with arrows and I could tell that the power of wind was infused with it. It had on a gold blindfold that blew in the breeze; it's eyes were covered just like Kazemon's. "Breezovemon!"

"Let's go!" Lunardramon shouted.

The three of us all flew up into the air, catching up to Lucemon easily. We all grabbed a hold if it's tail and dragged it back down to the station.

We fell back down, dragging the monster along with us. "The orb! Go inside the orb!" Bokomon screamed from below.

We all nodded and flew inside, piercing through the glass and making our way through the purple smog. We saw a larvae-like Digimon sitting there, floating around. It was the Lucemon larvae.

It was also our target.

"Lets attack now!" Thundramon cried.

"Flaming luna!" Lunardramon yelled, shooting it with a red and silver beam.

"Bolo axes!" Thundramon yelled, throwing it's lightning axes at the larvae.

"Love struck gale!" we cried. We hit the larvae with a blast of wind decorated with small, red, glowing hearts.

The larvae reeled backwards, crying out as it was hit with our combined attacks.

"And now…" Lunardramon began. He grabbed out hand, then he grabbed Thundramon's hand, putting them together. He looked up at us with the handsome face. "Together."

We all merged together as one, all of our powers combing, all as one mine. "Susanoomon!"

"Celestial blade!" we all called out as one. A large gold sword wielding all twelve signs on it appeared in out hand and we stabbed straight through Lucemon.

It let out a strangled cry and it's fractal code began to leak out, flowing like a river out of it's body and through a portal. We floated along with it, separating into our respective bodies and landing on a piece of floating rock.

We watched, mesmerized, as the Digital World began to some back.

"Thank you." a voice said. We all turned to see Agunimon, accompanied by all the other Legendary Warriors standing there, smiling at us. "All of you. Without your help we would have been lost." he said.

"Back at you. If not for you, we'd be lost a bunch of times." Takuya replied.

"Maybe, but we would be powerless… without you." Agunimon replied.

"You helped us…" Kumamon began.

"More than we helped you." Beetlemon said.

"That's for sure." Lobomon said.

"Most definitely." Veenomon said.

"Contento." Kazemon said.

"Hold on a second here, you speak Italian?" Izumi asked in shock.

"Of course she does. She's a part of you now." Junpei said. "So what did she say?"

"I said that I'm happy." Kazemon stated.

"I am too." Izumi said, smiling up at Kazemon.

Data began to seep from our D-tectors and go to the Digital World. "The data! It's returning!" Tomoki cried.

"It's going home. The Digital Worlds needs it now." Lobomon said. "Look behind you."

The World was coming back, the forests and the oceans all returning back to it's original spots.

"Thanks to everything you've done, our world is being reborn." Veenomon said. "You've given us all a second chance."

"We did it." Kouji said softly.

"Together." I added.

"And we actually did it right this time." Izumi said with a soft laugh.

"I never had a doubt we'd win." Takuya said... Lies…

"Gimme a break." Tomoki laughed.

"So does that mean… it's over?" Junpei asked last.

"Yes. It's over. It's actually better. It can thrive now that it's free from evil." Agunimon said. "Well, at least for now."

"Then it's up to you. Now don't go messing it up, buddy." Takuya said.

Agunimon's eyes suddenly widened, and each of our respective warriors grabbed our arms and tossed us to the sky.

"The wormhole that Lucemon made to the real world is disappearing! You must get through before it closes!" Agunimon yelled.

"Wait! This is no way to say goodbye!" Izumi cried.

"Oh… well… bye!" Veenomon shouted. She and Kazemon began to wave, then the rest of them did as well. I guess Kazemon and Veenomon are best friends, kind of like Izumi and myself are.

"NO! WAIT! DON'T LEAVE!!!" Bokomon cried. "I'll miss you!!!"

He tried to fly over to the portal, but Neemon and the others held him back.

"We love you!" Izumi and I yelled.

We got through the portal and it closed behind us, blocking off any entrance to the Digital World.

"K-Kouji." a voice crackled. Kouji picked up his D-tector and looked at it. "Kouichi is still alive. The bond between us is strong. Even though we've been separated, I can still feel him. You must find him Kouji!"

As soon as those words left his mouth a door opened in front of us, and we were inside of the elevator. It was Shibuya Station, the exact same time and day as when we left.

"This way! He's this way!" Kouji yelled. Running to the right and down some stairs. We all followed ad ran by cops who were saying something about falling and a boy with a hat.

Kouichi.

Kouji slammed through some doors and there, lying in front of us was Kouichi. Kouichi, who we thought had died was lying there, barely breathing, a mask on his face and doctors surrounding him. But he was alive.

"Kouichi!" Kouji screamed hysterically, running over to his brother.

The doctors tried to grab Kouji. "No! Let go of him!" I didn't even realize I had said it until Takuya and I had pushed ourselves between the doctors and Kouji, being sure to keep a good distance from the twins.

"Please step away." the head doctor growled.

I shook my head and Takuya snarled. "Back up." he snapped.

"Kouichi? I'm here. Kouichi, oh god, Kouichi, please wake up. Please."

I turned and saw Kouji holding his brother's hand, the heart monitor flat lining. Kouji had tears dripping down his face and he was sobbing. "Kouichi! Please! Kouichi wake up!" He let out a broken sob, resting his forehead on his lap. "Please…"

**Beep**

The heart monitor let out one small sound. Then another, then another.

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

Alive. Kouichi was alive.

"K-Kouji…" Kouji sat up and Kouichi raised a hand for Kouji to grab. "You're here. You're really here."

Kouji grabbed his brother and held him to his chest sobbing. "I thought you were dead… Oh god, Kouichi. I'm sorry." he cried.

Kouichi simply rubbed his back weakly.

And everything was okay.

~*~*~

An ambulance came for Kouichi minutes later, and they had to take Kouchi to the hospital, but not without the still crying Kouji in the back, holding his hand the whole time.

The five of us walked out of the station and I felt as if there was something I needed to do.

Takuya decided to be a man and walk Izumi home, while Tomoki's mom gave him and Junpei a ride home. Although I was offered a ride, I declined. I was right where I needed to be.

~*~*~

"Excuse me! Pardon me!" I yelled as I ran past the people walking out of the large skyscraper. I ran into the building, running through the lobby and pushing past people to get to the elevator. I pressed the button for floor number 58 and waited as the elevator slowly climbed to the top.

As soon as the doors opened I ran to the secretary's desk. The brunette secretary smiled at me, "Hi Keiko, is there anything I can do for you, sweetheart?" she asked.

"Hi Ayaka… Is… is my brother still here?" I asked.

"Yes he's in his office. He's not busy with anything right now, so go right ahead and go inside." she said.

"Thanks." I said, running over to the door and pushing it open. I closed it behind me and my oldest brother, Naoki stood up from his chair.

"Keiko?" he asked in a confused tone.

"Umm… Naoki… I just wanted to stop in and say hello." I said, smiling at him.

"Oh, well, hello. I'll be home at nine tonight, Kei. It's already seven, couldn't wait that long?"

"No… I just… wanted to see you before I went back home." I explained.

"Alright." he said, laughing.

"Well, I'm off." I said, turning and grabbing the doorknob.

"Hey Keiko?" I turned and looked at him. "You've really changed." he stated.

I smiled. "Well, a few things happened while I was gone." I said.

Naoki smiled at me. "I like the new you."

"You know what? I do too."

**END**

**Or maybe it's not. Check my page and you'll see a sequel.**

**Wow… I'm really done with Digimon Frontier Refreshed. Aren't I? God… I just want to say that I couldn't have done it without all of you guys. You were great with all of your support. Every little thing, every little PM, review, they all helped me move forward. Thank you all so much. I love you all.**

**Now, as you know there will be a sequel. It'll be coming out very soon, so don't cry. :D I'm close to crying right now, but I'm happy. I've come so far, and it's only the beginning.**

**I'd like to thank two people quickly.**

**Sydneybell24. You have been there from the middle, and you've supported me when I was ready to just end it. Thank you for all of your love and advice. And for being a kick ass friend.**

**And Celestial writer. You have been there from day 1. The first day I posted this bad boy you were there to review it and give me advice and I must say, if it weren't for your reviews, I probably wouldn't be finishing this fic. Thanks so much.**

**To my other reviewers:**

**DigiLoveReader, My-little-star, SamHedstrom, Digifan1000, PurpleViolin, Empyrea, Yuki's little girl. Thank you all so much for the time you put into the reviews, you're truly amazing.**

**Thanks again. And goodnight.**


	36. Prologue: Right

****

Empyrea: Thanks so much! I'm glad you liked the revision. And my fic's wonderful?! Thank you!!! And that choco chip cookie made my life. :D

Celestial Writer: Thanks for the review! I'm glad you liked the ending. In the beginning I was going to end it where Keiko said she had to do something, then continue it from that point in the sequel… but I thought it would work out better this way. I'm totally excited as well, and the sequel will be out VERY soon. But, just quickly, I really want to thank you for all the support you've given me throughout this whole adventure, it meant a while lot to me.

PurpleViolin: Aww, your review made me smile. I'm glad that you enjoyed my story and that you're sticking around for the sequel. Thanks so much!

My-Little-Star: Thanks for the review! I'm so glad you're excited for the sequel and that you're sticking around and reviewing it. I'll see ya soon!

DigiLoveReader: Thanks so much! I'm glad you liked the ending. And if it weren't for amazing reviews like this, I wouldn't have been able to stick with this story, so thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Yuki's Little Girl: Thanks for the review! I'm excited too!

Sydneybell24: Oh my god, Sydney, you're review is making me get all teary eyed. Thank you so much. You've honestly been a great support throughout this whole fic. I'm so happy that we've become friends over the course of this story. I absolutely adore you, and your reviews have motivated me. I remember the day that I was so scared and I was feeling threatened by all the other, more successful OCs and I immediately came to you. I remember how you called me an idiot and said that if I ever thought something like that again, you would hunt me down and tear me apart. That day you told me I had nothing to worry about, and that I didn't have to worry about other stories and only what I thought was right. You've helped me be the best author(ess) I could ever hope to be. Thank you so much for your love and support Sydney, you have been the best reviewer I could ever ask for. And just in case other readers read this review, Sydney is now my official beta. She's the best. So yeah… Thanks so much, Syd.

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Takuya POV:

Two weeks ago we saved the Digital World. Two weeks ago, we destroyed Lucemon and helped bring back the lost areas of the Digital World. Two weeks ago, I met Kouji, Kouichi, Keiko, Izumi, Junpei and Tomoki. And two weeks ago, I made six new best friends.

"_Yeah, Kouji and I could give you a ride."_

"Thanks, Kouichi, I really appreciate it," I switched the phone to my right ear. "So have you been to her house, yet?"

"_No. Neither has Kouji. We asked Izumi if she had been, but she said she only picked her up a couple times. Apparently it's a freakishly huge mansion. Her words, not mine."_

"Sweet! I've never been to a freakishly huge mansion, so this'll be awesome."

"_I know, I'm so excited. Hey, I've got to go, Kouji needs his beauty rest."_

I heard somebody snarl something to Kouichi and I laughed, "Alright, tell him not to forget his beauty mask."

Kouichi chuckled into the phone, _"Will do. Goodnight, Takuya."_

"Goodnight." I hung up the phone and set it on my desk, curling up into my red sheets.

Tomorrow was the big day, and I was excited to finally go to the freakishly huge mansion.

**Break**

I re-read the invitation, making sure I didn't forget anything. I looked at the small card, looking at each of the things Keiko wrote down.

_Reunion Party!  
__Who: Keiko  
__What: Reunion Party  
__Where: 813 Westhill Road  
__When: June 26, 6:00 p.m.- June 27, 3:00 p.m.  
__Why: Because!  
__Bring:  
__-A bathing suit (for swimming in the morning)  
__-A towel (for swimming in the morning)  
__-A sleeping bag  
__-And other obvious necesities_

_RSVP at 382-9472._

I had everything in my bag and when a car horn honked, I walked outside to Kouji and Kouichi's dad's SUV.

"Hey." I said as I climbed into the back with Kouji and Kouichi.

"Did you forget anything?" Kouji asked skeptically.

"Nope, I made sure." I said, grinning and raising my bag for emphasis.

The car ride was quiet and relaxing, well it was until we got into Keiko's neighborhood. There were huge houses all around us, all along the street, surrounded by very intricately designed bushes and hedges. Trees surrounded some sides and there were some elevated pool decks visible. "Holy. Crap." I squeaked as we pulled up to the end of street where a silver gate, the word 'Takishita' on it, was blocking the way to a long driveway.

"Err… What do I do?" Kouji and Kouichi's dad asked quietly, looking around. As soon as he said that, the gates opened and we were able to drive in. The driveway must've been another street, it led us down for a bit, then right, forward again then left. That's when we saw it.

"Wow." the four of us said at once. The driveway had large trees on it's sides, it led to the right of the mansion. The house was about four stories tall, and it looked as if it belonged to a queen. It was cream colored, blue shutters on it's windows and a pair of large wooden double doors. In front of the house was a large, silver-gated, in-ground swimming pool, with two diving boards and a blue slide. We pulled up the rest of the way into the driveway, which led to the right side of the mansion. There was a five-car garage there, two convertibles and a red motorcycle sitting inside. To the left was another door on the side of the house and in the back yard there were two soccer goals set up on each side of the yard. A large tree with a simple wooden swing was near four golf carts. A hill in the far back led down somewhere else, but we couldn't see what was down there.

"Whoa…" I mumbled.

"Thanks for the ride, dad." Kouji said as we clambered out of the car. The SUV drove out of the driveway and as soon as it was out of sight, we heard a squeal.

Izumi ran up to us at top speed, jumping up and down excitedly, "Isn't it awesome?" she exclaimed, sending birds out of their safe nests.

"Izumi, relax." a voice said softly behind her. We turned around to see Junpei, Tomoki and Keiko walking up, Keiko pushed a strand of soft brown hair behind her ear. "Hey guys." she said, smiling.

It was kind of funny to see everybody wearing other things besides the regular outfits. Junpei was wearing a forest green t-shirt with jeans and sneakers, apparently ditching the body suit.

Tomoki was wearing a pale orange t-shirt with shorts and no shoes, he must not have put any on.

Izumi was wearing a sky blue shirt that said 'Shibuya Cheer' and a pair of white shorts; she didn't have shoes on either, she must've been too excited to put any on.

Kouichi was wearing a green shirt and plaid shorts, white sneakers on his feet.

Keiko was wearing a lime green shirt that had about four buttons at the top, two buttons were un-done and she wore a gray tank top on underneath, she wore black shorts and a pair of lime green flip-flops.

Kouji was wearing a dark blue polo and a pair of khaki shorts with white sneakers and of course, the infamous bandana.

I looked at my own appearance as well: I wore a red t-shirt and gray sweatpants with red sneakers, I was still wearing the hat with the goggles, because _obviously _that would never grow old.

"Now can we swim, Keiko? Please?" Izumi squealed, grabbing Keiko's arm and jumping up and down. Suddenly, she froze, "No! Let's show them the house!" she yelled.

"Err… Alright…" Keiko said, she waved us forward, "C'mon, I'll give you a tour."

We followed her up the steps to the side of the house and went through the door. There was a closet to out right and two pairs of doors to our right. Straight ahead was a huge kitchen. She waved for us to follow her and we walked through the short hall and into the kitchen. There were polished marble countertops, shining brightly with all sorts of appliance ordered neatly over it. The floors were absolutely flawless, you could literally stare at your reflection in it. A large stainless steel refrigerator stood by the marble cabinets; six bowls were laying on the ground, they were stainless steel. Three filled with water, three filled with food.

"You have pets, Keiko?" Kouichi asked curiously.

"Yeah. Two dogs and a cat." Keiko said as I stared at the television mounted over the marble fireplace next to the glass table.

She brought us through the door that we saw at the entrance. It was the one farther from the door. "Dining room." Keiko said, letting us go through.

There was a huge silver chandelier above the table, which was long and a dark shade of wood. It was spotless. There was a wine rack that was shining spotlessly. It was absolutely perfect.

Keiko pushed open a door that led to a large lobby area. The floor was wooden and clean. What, are they neat freaks or something? There was a huge staircase, a door that led to another room, and a large hall to go to a different area of the house. Keiko led us down the hallway and pointing to the different doors, saying what they were: 'Bathroom, guest room, closet, living room…'

She led us up the large staircase and showed us several other rooms. More guest rooms, more bathrooms, her brothers' rooms, another living room. She knocked on a door and after a moment a voice called back.

"Come in."

We all walked in and we gasped. It was a large office with a huge chair. A very high-tech looking computer sat on a very expensive looking oak desk. There were literally thousands of books on the walls all around as well as a leather couch to the side. Fax machines, phones, printers… the room had everything. The person who was sitting in the chair turned and looked at us. "Oh, hey Keiko." he said with a smile.

Izumi grabbed my arm and gaped.

**Izumi POV:**

I don't think I have ever seen somebody so beautiful in my life.

This guy, whoever the hell he was, had the most beautiful face I had ever seen. He had light brown hair, a shade or two lighter than Keiko's hair, which was a medium brown. He was tall and had a stunning face. He had these amazing blue eyes that were light and seemed to glow; his lips were pouty; he had long eyelashes and when he smiled I wanted to faint. Who was this guy?

"Hi Naoki." Keiko said smiling. Naoki… Naoki as in _Keiko's _Naoki?!? "Guys, this is my older brother, Naoki." Keiko said.

"Hey guys." Naoki said. I shivered. His voice was smooth and beautiful. I think I am in love with Keiko's brother.

"I just wanted to show them the office before we watch the movie." Keiko explained.

_Ohmygodohmygodohmygodimstandinginfrontoftherichestmaninjapanandhesbeautifulandperfectandhessocuteandhesfamousandohmygodicantbreathe!!!_

Keiko pointed to each of us. "Takuya, Kouji, Junpei, Tomoki, Kouichi." Naoki shook each of their hands with a smile…

"_And this is Izumi." Keiko said. Naoki looked over at me and smiled._

"_Oh yes, I remember Izumi. Izumi's the reason we're having this 'reunion party'. I'm going to propose to her, because I've fallen in love with her already." Naoki got down on one knee. "Orimoto Izumi, will you marry me?"_

"_Yes!" I squealed hugging the most beautiful man I have ever seen in my eleven years of life._

"And this is Izumi." Keiko said, smiling.

I blinked and sighed, sometimes I let my imagination run wild.

"Hi, Izumi." Naoki said, smiling. He held his hand out and I shook hands with him, sparks going through my body, "I'm glad I could finally meet you, Keiko has been raving about having a new best friend for weeks now." he said, chuckling.

I smiled and tried not to cry tears of joy. He was so beautiful. "Alright, guys. Next floor." Keiko said. We left the room and I was about to beg Keiko to go back when suddenly another boy walk out of a bathroom. ONLY DRESSED IN A TOWEL?!?He was gorgeous as well. He had darker hair, not as dark as Kouji's or Kouichi's, though. It was sort of mussed from the shower that he obviously just came from, but so so so sexy. He had an amazing chest and stomach and he was completely toned. He had blue eyes, but a cerulean color, not as light as Naoki's.

He raised an eyebrow at all of us. "Sorry." he said in an amused voice. He looked at each of us and smirked. "I forgot your party was today, Keiko. Didn't mean to give your friend a permanent red face." he said, looking at me. I honestly thought I was going to get a nosebleed from this guy.

Keiko sighed. "That's what happens when you walk out of the shower without a shirt. That's what happened to Michiko, too. Except she fainted. Get dressed you whore."

"Aren't you going to introduce me?" he asked.

Keiko rolled her eyes. "This is Keiji. Keiji, this is Izumi, Kouji, Kouichi, Takuya, Tomoki and Junpei."

Keiji smiled and waved at us. "Hey guys." Yeah. Now I _really _thought I was going to get a nosebleed.

He walked towards a bedroom and smiled back. "See you later." he said with a sultry look before walking through the door.

"Keiko, I think that I want to be adopted into your family." I said softly, staring at the door.

Keiko smiled and led us up to another floor. There were more guest rooms, three more bathrooms and another living room with about eight different game systems. She pointed to another room. "This is my brother's room. His name is Saburo." she said.

"Stop talking shit about me!" a voice yelled from inside the room. The door opened and I was almost 100 percent sure I was going to have a serious **nosebleed**. This brother was gorgeous as well. He had a hair color the same as Keiko and bright green eyes. They were a weird color, not as weird as Keiko's eye color, but they were, like, _dangerously_ green. He was wearing a blue t-shirt and athletic shorts.

"What's up?" he asked nonchalantly. He looked at each of us and smiled when his eyes landed on me. "You're Izumi?" he asked.

"Yeah." I answered with a smile.

"Yeah, I figured. You're the only girl." He said with a laugh. He looked at Tomoki. "You're… Tomoki, right? "

Tomoki nodded and grinned brightly. "That's me!" he chirped.

Saburo smiled then looked over at Kouji and Kouichi. "You're the twins." he stated. He narrowed his eyes at them and pointed to Kouichi. "You're the older one… Kouichi…" then he pointed to Kouji. "And you're the younger one. Kouji." he said. The twins nodded.

He looked at Junpei. "Junpei. Oldest out of the whole gang of… whatever you call yourselves." he said slowly, looking at Keiko.

He looked at Takuya next. "Takuya. Leader with the goggles and the bad temper." he said.

Takuya's eyes widened. "What?!?" he yelled.

"But Keiko said you're a good soccer player. That's my sport. I like you already!" he squealed, pulling Takuya into a tight hug and lifting him into the air. He was swinging him around back and forth and saying how they were going to be best friends and soccer pals and everything good in life.

"Saburo! Don't kill him!" Keiko yelled, pulling Takuya away from her brother. "Okay… now let's _continue _our tour." Keiko said, glaring at Saburo, then leading us up some more stairs.

"I like him." Takuya said, smiling, but at the same time, looking utterly puzzled.

Keiko laughed and brought us up down a long hall and stopped in front of a door. "Don't touch anything. You have to promise me you won't touch a thing." Keiko said.

We all nodded slowly and Keiko opened the door. "This, is my parents' bedroom." she said. The room was large and spacious, it had a large scarlet colored bedspread with a large painting mounted over it. There was a marble fireplace with pictures on the mantel.

"We never touched it or anything. Thought it would preserve their presence. We decided to make it as if they never left." she explained. And she was smiling. I knew something about Keiko from the start. She was proud of her parents, her family. She was proud of where she came from, and who raised her and she just wanted people to realize how hard her family worked for what they have today.

It's amazing, really, Keiko's brother is a very brave person. He took over the largest business in Japan - Takishita Studios, the largest movie production company in the country - at age 18; he had to fight for the right to keep his siblings; he lost his mother and father; he had to take care of three other people; and at the same time of all of this, he went through college.

It's a feat that he was able to do all of that and not completely lose his mind. Takishita Naoki has earned every right to get the honors he has received. Richest man in the world, hardest working man in the world, best business man in Japan, etc. etc.

"Alright. Next floor." Keiko said, still smiling brightly. She led us up one more floor to where there was a landing that had a door on the right and on the left. She opened the door on the left and opened it. I couldn't hold back the gasp.

The bedroom, which was obviously Keiko's, was absolutely beautiful. The floor was a medium brown wood, which shone and sparkled in the light. The bed was on a raised part of the floor, where you walked up two steps to get to the bed. The bedspread was green and blue. The sheets were blue with green stripes while the comforter was green with white designs. There were a few band posters on the wall, as well as pictures with her friends. Another door was next to her bed, it was opened and you could see a spacious bathroom with a marble Jacuzzi bath and a huge glass shower. Next to the bathroom door there was a white shelf with several of Keiko's items. Soccer trophies, seashells, a few black and white pictures and a pink hippopotamus plush doll. There was a white vanity and above that, a flat screen T.V. on the wall, which was faced so Keiko could watch the television from her bed. A dresser was positioned next to a large balcony which faced the front of the house and showed a good view of the pool. A walk in closet was on the opposite wall of the bathroom and it had several articles of clothing in it. Next to the door for the walk in closet was a very inviting looking blue sofa with green pillows and white trim. It was completely and utterly beautiful.

"Keiko… this is amazing." I said, taking a few more steps into the room and staring at my reflection in the hardwood floor.

"How long have you lived here, Keiko?" Kouji asked, walking in as well.

Keiko walked over to her bed and sat on it, Kouichi getting on as well as Takuya. "My whole life." she said, smiling.

Takuya rubbed his face into the comforter. "I want to steal your bed, Keiko. It's so comfyyyyy." he drawled, sniffing the blankets.

Junpei sat next to me on the couch, and Kouji sat on my other side. "It looks so perfect. It must've cost a pretty penny." Junpei said, moving up and down on the couch to test it's squishiness.

"I'm not sure. I've always had this room. We re-renovated it over and over as I grew up, though." Keiko said.

Tomoki touched one of the pictures on the wall. "Hey, Keiko. Is this Michiko?" he asked.

We all got up and looked at the picture. Keiko and another girl were dressed in soccer uniforms, their arms around each other and smiling at the camera. Michiko, who was apparently the other girl had auburn colored hair and light brown eyes, she had her hair up in a messy ponytail, as did Keiko. They both had red war paint on their cheeks and you could see some dirt on their faces. She had a really pretty smile and her eyes were a really cool color, they were golden-brown.

"Wow, she's really hot." Takuya said, his eyebrows raising. I wanted to punch him into a wall when he said that. But being the calm girl that I am, I just smirked.

"Yeah, she is really pretty. Is she your age?" Kouichi asked.

"Yeah. We play soccer together, I've known her for about two years or so. She's going to our school this year." Keiko said, smiling fondly.

There was a scratch on the door and we all turned around to see a small dark grey cat with white paws walk in. It looked at everyone in the room, studying it for a moment before it huffed and bounded onto the bed.

"Aww! How cute!" I squealed, going over to the bed and petting the cat.

"That's Mister Boots." Keiko stated.

"Mister Boots? How old is he?" I asked.

"It's a girl. And Mister Boots is six." she replied.

"A girl? Why's it's name _Mister _Boots if it's a girl, Keiko?" Kouichi asked, puzzled.

"Well, we didn't know Mister Boots was a girl until she was with us for four years, and even though Keiji and Naoki wanted to save her feminism, my parents, Saburo and I both wanted to keep the name." she said. "And besides, Mister Boots doesn't mind! Right, Mister Boots?"

The cat stared at her for a moment and literally raised it's eyebrow (do cats have eyebrows?) in a catlike way. It then closed it's eyes as if annoyed and shook it's head.

"Told you." Keiko said.

"Keiko? How did your cat know how to do that?" Tomoki asked shakily.

"Mister Boots is special." Keiko said fondly, scratching the cat behind the ears.

"Do you guys have any other pets?" Takuya asked.

"Yeah, we have two dogs. Two Siberian Huskies named Pacino and Sam." Keiko said, smiling.

A short moment of silence filled the room as we all looked around the room, checking out all of the things decorating the room. "You want to go down and watch the movie now?" Keiko asked.

"Sure."

We headed back to the first floor living room. Keiko motioned for us to sit on the couch as she got the television set up. She pushed a ton of buttons on the remote, and the TV turned on, the DVD player lit up and speakers slowly opened from different spots in the room, some even came from the ceiling.

"Jeez, Keiko." Takuya said in awe.

Keiko smiled and then walked over to the couch and sat down. Junpei sat on the end, Tomoki on his right; I sat next to Tomoki, and Keiko was on my right; Kouji was next and after him it was Kouichi and lastly Takuya. It was like we were a team again. All seven of us. And we all had the roles that we used to.

Takuya: The leader and the hothead.

Kouji: The sardonic one.

Kouichi: The peacemaker.

Keiko: The cute, nice one.

Junpei: The smart playmaker.

Tomoki: The young one.

And Izumi: … Izumi, the talkative one who will always stand up for her friends. Yeah, that's right.

And as we sat on the couch that night, I realized that I couldn't survive without these six people.

And it felt right.


End file.
